


A Rescue of the Alternative World Kind

by Tezca



Category: Country Music RPF, Doctor Who
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Doctor Who Fusion, Gen, Rescue, World Travel, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-19
Updated: 2018-05-19
Packaged: 2019-05-09 00:20:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 30,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14705582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tezca/pseuds/Tezca
Summary: Shit of a huge level of some kind usually happens when a Time Lord is involved. Like having to go to an alternate dimension with two friends to rescue the father of one of said friends. And said father is a famous country singer who doesn't know about the existence of aliens. Or that world traveling is very much possible.It definitely does not help either that in the alternate world version of Kid Rock (who Hank III has issues with) where he is a politician. Luckily the boys get help from a political counterpart of another country singer.





	1. Chapter 1

It was a surprised feeling to be had sure given his notion about him. He didn’t care for the most part, but just enough for avoidance (he also didn’t seek to make small talk so that helped too). See there was a party that Hank Jr and his wife decided to put together for family and close friends one nondescript day. Barbecue, good conversations, music and good times to be had. The source of the unwelcomed awkward feeling was from one Kid Rock. He had once upon a time in the relatively recent past accidentally lashed out at him verbally. It was something he regretted only because he knew he had better control than that. Yeah he has opinions and not afraid to say them but he was smart as hell enough to know when to not say them

And to his credit Kid Rock didn’t seem to be holding a grudge about it, or hell even remembered it considering the state of mind he was in at the time. But the memory was still seared into Shelton’s mind like a cringey mistake you did when you were a teen. It was enough to have the awkwardness creep up inside of his gut. And it was all in front of his dad too, that didn’t help quell the disappointment he felt for himself.

Like anyone that knew what integrity meant, Shelton had apologized to Kid Rock since then. Well to be truthful more to himself, but he didn’t need to know that. But of course that sure as hell didn’t mean they were friends, Shelton would rather make riveting small talk with a blade of grass, than have an hour or more long conversation with Kid Rock. Luckily so far, he didn’t have to deal with it, there were other people there that made coming here worth it enough.

Shooter was engrossed in a conversation with Jessi, Kris and one of his sisters, while his dad and Kid Rock was hanging around while his dad grilled up some burgers and ribs. He wanted to join up with the former group after he was done playing catch up with his youngest half brother. But before he could do so he was asked by his stepmom to bring out some more sodas from the fridge. Apparently the cooler was running low on Pepsi and Coca Cola. Of course he obliged. 

There wasn’t really anyone else inside except the Colonel and Katie, his youngest sibling. Apparently, they just ended a debate as Katie went back outside after she greeted him,“Hey Jon. I kinda figured you would be out there with Shooter.” Shelton joked in a casual tone.

“Haha well I went to get something from the Tardis and just came back in when I ended up discussing the state of country music with your sister.” The Colonel replied as he took a couple of beer cans from the fridge.

“I see.”

“Yeah it was pretty interesting. I couldn’t specifically tell her that there was a going to be a traditional country sound revival on mainstream radio in about a century but I just said in a non afternoon special way to be optimistic for the future..” The Colonel explained as set the two cans on the counter next to the sink.

Shelton chuckled while the Colonel opened up the cans and began to pour them out into the sink, “Right yeah. What did you get from the Tardis?”

“First off let me tell you the choice of beer your dad got tastes like shit covered piss.” The Colonel more or less whispered the last part as he faced Shelton.

“Don’t tell my dad that.”Shelton laughed lightly with a smile. There was some truth to that, Hank Jr’s choice of beer can be hit or miss. It just depended on the brand really.

“Never will. You don’t live 530 something years without knowing when to shut up.” The Colonel added to more soft laughter between the two as he glanced at him for a second then back at the sink, “Of course I might made a few mistakes with that hear and there.” The Colonel admitted concededly as he set the now empty cans back on top of the counter.

“I bet most people had moments like that.”

The Colonel then reached into his jacket and took out a bright blue bottle with a label that was filled with obvious alien language, “I was getting a better tasting alternative.” He said as Shelton took it for a closer look, “That’s premium alcohol from the planet N’xea. Wonderful planet, thought shame their version of a jukebox very much underwhelmed me. Still nothing like the jukeboxes found here on Earth.” He added a little off tangentially with a friendly smile of his own

The dots were easy to connect why he dumped out the contents of the cans. The bottle definitely stood out enough to not pass for something Earth made, “I’ll open it for you.” Shelton offered and quickly found something from the drawers. After he got it open he took one whiff of the smell and recoiled a bit with a little wheeze type of cough, “Geez this smells weird.” Shelton handed the bottle back to him. 

“To you maybe, but not to me. Alien taste buds.”

“Kinda figured.” Shelton said as he took a look back out towards the backdoor. Luckily no one seemed to be headed their way. Shelton turned back to face the Colonel, “I bet that stuff tastes as nasty as it smells to us humans.”

“Probably. It’s not harmful, but I wouldn’t recommend it to any of y’all.”

“We can give the other can to Kid Rock.” Shelton joked and the two chuckled. He was obviously not being serious, he wasn’t that mean spirited and plus that would be a real dick thing to do anyways, and would bring the wrath of Kris Kristofferson on both of their asses. In a verbal way that is.

“That ain’t a good idea.” The Colonel said with another chuckle as he poured the contents of the bottle into the two cans. Shelton was about to comment on the fact that the cans was still open therefore it was gonna be obvious. He was going to jokingly doubt his species intelligence. But the Colonel took out his sonic screwdriver and looked through the settings before he pointed it where the tabs used to be, “Localized perception filter. This baby can do anything.” He explained afterwards as he put it back in his pocket before he paused for a second, “Except anything to do with wood. Sonic screwdrivers don’t affect wood for some reason.” He proceeded to hide one of the cans inside his jacket as well as the empty out of place bottle.

The Colonel grabbed the other one and took a drink before they headed out. Shooter was the first to have noticed them outside, “I was wondering where y’all was at.” He chuckled with a smile.

“I got a little distracted before I was able to hide that alien alcohol I told you about.” The Colonel replied before Shelton added after him.

“I can tell you it smells like rotten liquid shit, ”Shelton stated while the Colonel playfully rolled his eyes.

Shooter laughed while the Colonel added to his defense, “Well to me it tastes like liquid alcoholic heaven.” 

Sometime after they had a chance to eat the food Hank Jr walked up behind them. He had on a happy smile on his face, “Hey boys you want to see something interesting I found the other day? I found it while I was out metal detecting in the woods over there.”

The Colonel’s interest was piqued because he lived through part of America’s past. He lived on Earth since the early 1800s and he knew Hank Jr was a Civil War buff so it stood to reason that whatever Hank Jr found was probably an artifact was from that era of American history, “Sure that’ll be cool.” 

“What did you find?” Shooter asked. 

“Well it ain’t what I usually fine but its still interesting, I’ll show y’all.” Hank Jr motioned to follow him and he led them to where he kept his Civil War collections. Hank Jr walked over to a shelf to grab what looked like a weird black metal bracelet that looked crudely made. The moment the Colonel saw what he grabbed he felt his body tensed up. The hairs stood up as he felt himself freeze up for a few seconds. It definitely wasn’t something from this planet, “Now this doesn’t look like it came from the late 1800s but I didn’t know where else to put it so I left it here.”

“Is that one of those smart watches?” Shelton asked and Hank Jr shrugged as he walked back over to the others. He leaned for a closer and realized it didn’t really look like a smartwatch at all. In fact, it didn’t look like any kind of watch or bracelet he’d seen before. Although it did have a screen on there.

“Hell if I know, it got a screen and buttons but I wasn’t able to get it working.” Hank Jr replied as he fiddled with the thing a bit.

“Looks cool though.” Shooter said as he took a look at the weird looking bracelet. He took a good enough look to see some weird writing on it. Shelton had noticed the same thing, and they both wondered if it was made on Earth at all due to said weird writing. The overall look was a factor too. Maybe it was from future Earth at the least? The Colonel would know better.

Suddenly the screen blinked on and it captivated Hank Jr’s curiosity long enough for the Colonel to pull Shelton and Shooter back a bit before he whispered. It was painfully obvious they would have to get the device away from Hank Jr, “That’s a world hopping bracelet. Some idiot must’ve left it here. Or dumped it here.” Only concern is will he be able to think of a convincing enough reason for Hank Jr to hand it over to him. Thankfully it wasn’t too much of one.

“Cool!” Shooter whispered all amazed. Imagine all the worlds they can go and visit with a device like that.

Suddenly they were jostled out of their thoughts when a short flash of light occurred out of the corner of their eyes. The three looked up and indeed they were the only ones left in the room, “Oh shit this ain’t good.” Shelton said as he stared at the spot was his dad was a moment ago.


	2. Chapter 2

This is not what the Colonel expected today. This ain’t what anyone here expected today, and what added to this problem was the fact there were other people here. People that required an alibi to explain Hank Jr’s absence, “And this is what I was afraid of...fuck!” He said out loud frustrated.

“How the hell are we even going where he landed in?!” Shelton asked. For all of his issues he has with his dad he certainly hoped he’ll be alright. He felt bad thought for having a part of him be glad this meant they didn’t have to save Kid Rock’s ass. He didn’t want to deal with him anymore than absolutely needed. Conversely, it meant Kid Rock was still here and accounted for so obviously that was good news.

“I’ll figure that out, you two go and tell Kris and Jessi what happened.” The Colonel instructed as he took out his sonic screwdriver.

“Alright.” Shooter said and he followed Shelton back out to the backyard in what felt like record time. 

Luckily there weren’t too many people around Kris and Jessi, in fact, they looked like they were lost in their own friendly conversation at the table. They didn’t know too many people aside from Hank Jr’s immediate family and the Colonel so they didn’t mind just each other friendly company while they finished off a dessert Mary had made, “Kris! Mom we got a problem, a huge problem!” Shooter stated as he leaned into their faces before he sat down next to Jessi, “Hank Jr accidentally found a device that allows you to travel in the multiverse and then he poofed in thin air!”

Shelton rolled his half heartedly at Shooter’s idea of a clear explanation and chuckled, “That was completely sufficient.” He teased as Kris looked at them with confusion on his face.

“Wait hold on a second...what do you mean he went poof in thin air? You mean whatever the hell he had, got activated and it teleported him away?” Kris asked for clarification and Shelton nodded.

“Yeah dad found it and showed it to us. Next thing we knew there was a flash of light and he was gone.”

“Oh hell.” Kris sighed as he promptly ignored the bite he was about to take. That was definitely the definition of a huge problem, “Folks here are going to quickly wonder where the hell he is. Especially Mary.”

“He can be in any dimensions, I assume it’ll be hard to pinpoint exactly which one.” Jessi added just as the Colonel arrived at their table. She was also now worried about how long it’ll take, cause eventually it’ll look like something horrible happened to Hank Jr more and more to the perspective of those not in the know. She didn’t want Hank Jr to come back to everyone thinking he got killed or something.

“I got enough of his trace for the Tardis to get a lock on it. You two can do damage control while we go look for him.” 

Kris nodded with an assured smile, “We can do that.”

Jessi, on the other hand, felt nervous, “I can’t think of anything off the top to say.” She admitted as Shooter got back up.

“Don’t worry Jessi we’ll think of something.” Kris said before he faced the other three, “Y’all be careful, and don’t hesitate to call if y’all need any help.”

“Yes sir. Hopefully this won’t take too long.” The Colonel said carefully optimistic as he looked at Shooter and Shelton. A part of him hoped and wanted this to not take too long but the more world weary and knowledged side told him to expect some kind of problem to be had, “Let’s go.”

Once in the Tardis, the Colonel moved around the console to set it up while the other two watched. The room wasn’t filled with complete silence save for the beeps and hoops of the mainframe thanks to Shooter. He was pretty excited about going to another universe, “Hey Shelton you have any guess on what kind of world we’re going to? I do. Several in fact.”

“I just hope whatever world it is Hank Jr ain’t done anything stupid, which frankly I’m not sure if I have faith that he hasn’t.” Shelton rolled his eyes. Lord help them all if they found Hank Jr had decided to get rowdy again for old time sakes. He looked around the room for a second before back at Shooter, it had been several weeks since they all took a trip in the Tardis together.

“I’m sure he won’t.” Shooter said with a hopeful tone. 

Shelton thought about it for a second not sure how felt about the whole thing to be honest. He wasn’t sure how to respond. Sure yeah he trusted Hank Jr to not get into shit objectively, his dad had gotten a lot better since his rowdy days, but it felt more like 99.9% percent of the time. He just ended up changing the subject, “What kinda world are you guessing we’re going?”

“He-Man!”

“Isn’t that a cartoon?” Shelton asked for clarification. 

“Yeah or maybe we’re going to the Game of Thrones universe!”

“I hope not!” The Colonel immediately spoke up from behind the wide pillar in the middle of the console area as soon as he heard Shooter, “Too dangerous, we might as well get killed the minute we set foot on there.” 

“Well thank you for the vote of confidence Jon.” Shooter deadpanned lightly. Yeah he had a point, and a place like that wouldn’t spell good times for Hank Jr either. Shelton meanwhile couldn’t help but chuckled at the exchange there, he had to agree with the Colonel on that one.

Shooter thought for a second more before he face Shelton with another guess in mind, “The Dark Tower universe! Jon took me there once for my birthday, it was fun!” 

“For about 30 minutes until we had to leave abruptly thanks to Walter o’Dim showing up unexpectedly.” The Colonel clarified and Shooter looked as though he forgot about that crucial detail and felt a little embarrassed as a result.

“Oh right…forgot that part.” That was decidedly not fun except in a risk taker, adrenaline pumping way as they escaped to the Tardis back then according to his memory.

“How about a universe that won’t be dangerous in one way or another for all of us.” Shelton suggested in a friendly matter.

“All I know is we’re going to a parallel universe 147 dimensions to the left.” The Colonel said as he pressed the button to activate the Tardis.

After they landed, the boys followed the Colonel (he had by now taken off his jacket he had on earlier) up the stairs, and out the door to reveal they were in a world that didn’t look too different from their Earth. The sky was the same old blue as their world, but the sun had seemed to be a bit less bright here. Like there was an Instagram filter over the sun that muted the colors a little.

“Is this Nashville?” Shelton wondered as he looked around at the buildings. They had parked somewhere in what appeared to be downtown. Didn’t looked like the Nashville they knew but then again different universe. 

Shooter pointed to what looked like this world’s version of the dome of the Congress building in the distance. Given apparently this was Canada in this world, it was probably called Parliament Hall or something, “Feels like we gone to Washington DC instead.” 

“That’s because it is. Or at least this world’s version of it.” The Colonel’s gaze landed on a flag high atop a building in the near distance. It was interesting to note given how it looked more like the Canadian flag rather than the American one, “Either this has always been Canada or Canada took over America in this world.” 

Shooter looked up where the Colonel gestured too while Shelton noticed something else that caught his eye on the window before them. Something disturbing, or to him it was, “That’s interesting.”

“I hate this universe already!” Shelton announced in a quiet sort of yell as he walked back. His sudden outburst caused Shooter to laugh and the Colonel to look at him. Shooter quickly noticed the reason for said outburst, there was campaign poster taped to the window for the re-election of Robert Ritchie Sr (aka Kid Rock to him) for President or in this case Prime Minister given the flag he saw a moment ago. 

“We barely been here for 5 minutes and you already hate it?” The Colonel chuckled, he noticed the poster and he did knew about Shelton’s adversity to him but it obviously wasn’t important right now. And Shelton knew that. To him and Shooter, it was funnier as hell that who they knew as a Detroit rapper would end up being the leader of a damn country in an alternative world.

“Any world where Kid Rock is in any position of power are full of fucking idiots.” Shelton quipped to more of Shooter’s laughter. The Colonel looked at him knowingly while Shelton crossed his arms and took a slightly annoyed but calm sigh. A small petty part of him want to hightail it back inside the Tardis just so he doesn’t get reminded of who exactly is Prime Minister here. But his good nature quickly overrode that however, “I’m not a massive dick, where do we start looking for my dad?”

“That I’m not sure.” The Colonel replied. Who to even say Hank Jr even landed in this particular city? But he knew that wasn’t even a question as the Tardis usually lands wherever the trace ended at. In this case DC, from there on they were on their own pretty much. 

“Maybe we can start with a place Hank Jr might go too? Like a bar?” Shooter offered then retracted it a bit as he was a little unsure, “He could be just wandering around wondering how the hell he got here in the first place.”

“Yeah…” The Colonel agreed and pointed down the sidewalk, “Let’s just go down here and wing it for now.”

“Good plan as ever.” Shelton shrugged, he didn’t really have any other better ideas. They all started to walk as they kept a look around for any tall, slightly chubby bearded man in a hat. There was one or two that looked similar to the description but alas wasn’t Hank Jr. Also along the way there was another political sign on the window of a small cafe. This time it was for who had to be the rival candidate. It had a picture of a middle age woman in a black cowboy hat on it.

The sight had stopped the three in their tracks. Or more Shooter and Shelton stopped and the Colonel backtracked a second after. The name right next to the picture is what got them to stare at it for a few seconds in semi stunned silence, “Is that Terri Clark?” Shooter asked out loud. It was a surprise to see specifically her as a politician in another world. In their world, Terri had no aspirations for a political career. Neither did Kid Rock really, the closest was when he made people think he was running for Senate as a PR stunt.

“Looks like it.” The Colonel said as he took a good look at the poster. He and Shooter have met Terri once or twice at a festival or two back home.

“I know who I’ll vote for.” Shelton stated, anyone that ran against Kid Rock has got to be better just on the fact alone that they ain’t Kid Rock. 

Shooter let out a short laugh as the Colonel took a look inside the window, “Well I didn’t expect it, but Hank Jr not in there.” 

“Well we can always go in and ask if anyone saw him. I have a picture of me and dad on my phone.” Shelton got out his phone and brought up a pic of them at a recent fishing trip, “Hopefully it’ll save us some time at least.”

“That’s a good idea Shelton.” 

They walked into the small cafe and straight to the cashier. Behind the desk was a young woman who cheerfully greeted them to the establishment, “Hello what can I get for you all today?”

“Hey actually we came to ask a question ma’am.” Shelton started off as he showed her his phone screen with the pic on it.

“Oh that's fine go ahead. Kinda slow right now anyways.”

“Thanks. We was wondering if you saw this bearded man anywhere? He is my dad and he came along with us on a trip down here to DC.” Shelton lied enough to for the other person to be convinced that they weren’t fact natives to this universe. Thankfully it was easy to do so.

“We were supposed to meet him up somewhere but we think he got lost and he doesn’t know his way around here.” Shooter added, he kinda banked on the hope that Hank Williams Jr wasn’t a famous singer in this universe with the implication that Hank Jr never been to Washington DC, but they could very well be wrong, “This is his first time visiting this place.”

“Oh I’m sorry to hear about that, and I wish I can tell you all I saw him, but I haven’t seen anyone that looks like that.” She replied apologetically, “Good luck in finding him.”

“That quite alright ma’am and thanks.” Shelton nodded.

“Thank you anyways for the help.” The Colonel added with a smile before they turned to walk back out the door. The next place they tried was a small little tabletop gaming store that was two buildings down. They could’ve tried the others ones but they looked like it was too busy and they didn’t want to take up too much time waiting. The more time elapsed, the more of a chance this could turn into a huge clusterfuck. 

They entered the little store and Shelton started to repeat the same spiel he said back at the cafe. Shooter looked at a nearby Dungeons and Dragons strategy book, it looked about the same as he remembered. it was still cool but the one next to it was one that he knew didn’t existed. It was definitely tempting to buy and to be truthful both him and the Colonel was tempted to browse around a bit but they also knew they had higher priorities.

“If we didn’t have our little problem I would totally buy some stuff here.” Shooter confessed to the Colonel.

“Well we can also come back some other time.” The Colonel replied. Meanwhile, Shelton got finished explaining and the man squinted a little at the picture.

“Huh your dad looks like my cousin George from Alabama!” The man said with a casual laugh, “Just a bit younger and shorter, but the beer gut and beard is spot on.” Shelton can’t help but chuckle at the description. His dad did have a bit of a beer gut going on. Can’t deny that.

“My dad been known to get drunk here and there, but that was years ago. He is doing better nowadays.” Shelton commented, that part he can divulge with no problem.

“That’s good. Never good to be an alcoholic when you get right down to it. And that’s coming from someone who’d you think otherwise when I was a youngin, but luckily I went and got help for myself just in time. So I could be wrong cause my eyesight ain’t what it used to be and I don’t want to disappoint y’all. But I think I saw someone like what your dad looked like more towards Capitol Hill. He was walking down the sidewalk when I came back from my lunch.”

“We’ll try down there then at least. Thank you very much sir.”

“You’re welcome.“ The man said and Shelton noticed some political buttons in a little basket on the table while Shooter and the Colonel started to head for the door, “Oh yeah feel free to take a button, we’re a proud supporter of Terri Clark here in this store!”

“Well so am I.” Shelton grabbed two of them with a bit old grin on his face before he thanked him again and followed the others out the door. He handed one of them to Shooter, “I grabbed one for you, figure you might get a kick out of having one.”

“Thanks. I think you’re getting a bigger kick out of this.” Shooter mentioned with a laugh.

Shelton let out a laugh of his own and nodded softly, “That’s fair to say. Anybody but Kid Rock always got my vote.” Shelton said. He fully knew the reason for running along with this all came out of some sort of passive vindictiveness towards Kid Rock.

“Hahaha.”

“What are the chances you think he’ll just be sitting at a park or something?” Shelton asked as he faced the Colonel after ten minutes of silent walking.

The Colonel shrugged, “Not too likely, I say Shooter’s dad would be more apt to stay calm then your dad in this kinda situation. At least quicker.” The Colonel paused then felt a little awkward on how that came out. One of his social fears was that he’d accidentally insult the human race in some legitimately hurtful way, “Not that I’m calling your dad dumb or…”

“No no, I feel the same way about your assessment,” Shelton reassured him. It was understandable, he would probably freak out too before his rational side in the beginning if he was unceremoniously dumped in another world while not knowing one can travel between alternate universes.

They continued to walk and so far they didn’t see anyone that resembled Hank Jr. They also probably should call and update Kris and Jessi. The Colonel got out his phone as they stopped to the side next to a park, “Wait can we even make interdimensional calls?”

“Yeah we should, or at least directly to Kris and Jessi’s phone.” The Colonel was about to dial when he noticed a woman not to far from them with a familiar object in her hands. This particular women also looked like the one they saw in that poster back at the cafe just sans cowboy hat.

The Colonel perked up and sprinted over, “Oh hey, um, excuse me ma’am that looks like uhh…”

“Oh is this yours? I wasn’t even sure where to begin looking for who owned this, I mean I know my options.” The women clarified she handed the device to him.

Hank Jr must’ve haphazardly thrown this away obviously he surmised, he might’ve aimed for the trashcan nearby, but missed. The Colonel gave a nod and took it from her, “It is, thanks.”

“It looked expensive so I figured someone lost it. Doesn’t look like any smartwatches I’ve seen.” Terri said before she noticed the button Shelton had put on his shirt and pointed to him with a friendly and humble smile, “I’m flattered to have your support sir.”

Shelton unabashedly answered despite obviously knowing nothing of how politics looked like in this world, “Thank you ma’am, happy to support anyone against Kid Rock! Hell if I was running myself my slogan would be ‘Say No to Kid Rock!’” Shelton said proudly and Shooter had to hide behind Shelton to hide any evidence of laughter.

Terri understandably looked at him with confusion written all over her face, “Who’s Kid Rock?”

Oh shit, he forgot about that as he blushed embarrassingly. Kid Rock wouldn’t be known by that nickname if he was a politician here. Well, he could but by her reaction no one in this world knew him as that, “Oh sorry ma’am my bad, I meant to say no to Robert Ritchie Sr!”

Terri let out a short but noticeable laugh. Now she understood, “Informally off the record here, I agree with you sir.” Terri replied in a little hushed voice, and Shelton let out a satisfied laugh.

The Colonel meanwhile looked at the device to see it wasn’t too damaged before he looked up at the women. Yeah from the way this woman just talked to Shelton, he is pretty damn sure this is the same one on the shirt they saw earlier (and who happened to be an alternative version of Terri Clark) aka the political candidate Shelton is automatically rooting for reasons mentioned earlier. Unfortunately, the Colonel blanked out on a plausible alibi that would make the most sense about the existence of the bracelet to her, so he decided to go for one that was more of a cop out to him. 

However the four were interrupted by the sudden sounds of police sirens. They turned around to see a couple of police cars race down the street. It send dread up the boys back and Shelton quickly brought up the phone screen to show to Terri. Somehow he didn’t have a good feeling about this. Meanwhile, the Colonel and Shooter ran down to the corner to see where the cars were headed towards, “Excuse me do you mind if you help us out for a second?”

“Always happy to. What’d you need?”

“Well we’re looking for my dad, he looks like this. He got lost earlier,” Shelton pointed on the screen, “Have you seen him?” He dead on hoped inside that his dad wasn’t in that direction. What if it was some shooter or something and he got caught in the crossfire?

Terri’s face turned pale as she took the phone to take a closer look. She had seen someone that looked like him earlier around the park earlier. He had looked disorentied, like he wasn’t sure where he was at. He must’ve since headed towards where the cars were going. A text notification suddenly popped up from the Colonel and she looked up at Shelton feeling awkward now, “Your dad being arrested!”

“Oh shit” Shelton immediately thought at his eyes widen in complete dread, the two suddenly bolted down to where Shooter and the Colonel were. There across the street at the gate at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, the three police officers subdued his dad on the ground as they put handcuffs on him. Nearby was this world’s version of Kid Rock.

Yeah this day wasn’t going to well. Fuck.


	3. Chapter 3

“I have to call Kris immediately.” The Colonel said as got out his phone and walked down the sidewalk behind him as to not be too conspicuous. Plus he didn’t want the officers to think he was calling about what they were doing. He did not want to fuck up this day any more then it had.

“I feel hopeless...what the fuck do we do!?” Shelton started to feel panicking as he ran his hands through his hair. He wanted to go and help his dad out, but he knew that wouldn’t be the greatest idea in this circumstance. They were in an another universe, therefore how were the officers here going to believe that this is just all a big misunderstanding.

“I don’t have a fucking clue. We can’t exactly go help unless we want to sleep in bars.” Shooter said. It didn’t really helped at all when some other groups of people started to see what the commotions was all about. Some were even taking videos and pics of the scene before them as Hank Jr was whisked away into the back of a police car and shortly being driven away. During one moment Shelton and Hank Jr locked their gaze on each other. He felt really bad he can’t just run out. For all his issues with his dad, he still cared about him enough to want him in his life. 

“Dad we’ll gonna rescue you!” He yelled out as the car rounded the corner. He looked about as freaked out as they were. Shelton didn’t let go of his gaze until the police car drifted out of eye sight. And even then he didn’t turn back around for a few seconds.

“This is gonna be all over the media by tonight…” Terri said out loud as she kept her gaze on her rival. He had on that annoying smug, satisfied look on his face, like he just discovered the location of the secret treasure of the universe before anyone else has. It irritated her, he had been looking for a way to get an edge over her, “Robert gonna use this to his advantage, mark my words.” She finished as she faced Shooter and Shelton with blunt honesty as the Colonel walked back over.

“Well Kris ain’t too happy.” The Colonel announced to no one’s surprise. On the other side of the phone Kris had let up a storm of cuss words, if it wasn’t for these situation the Colonel would immaturely giggled at the amount of swears coming from an 81 year old man who studied at the prestigious Oxford University in freaking Oxford, England.

“Who’s Kris?”

”He is um...I think we’re gonna have to explain everything to you so you have an idea how big of a problem this for us. That is if you want to help us….we could use some to tell you the truth. I’m the Colonel, this is Shelton and Shooter,” The Colonel started as he kept his voice down so only the three could hear.

“It’s going to sound really really crazy ma'am.” Shelton chimed in, then paused for a split second as he glanced around them, “We should probably go to a more private area.”

“There should be one in this park.” Terri suggested as she noticed she still had Shelton’s phone, and gave it back to him. She forgot she still had it until now which no one blamed her. It was a chaotic scene that will surely end up in more chaos. She led them to a spot underneath a tree where they got close together enough. Luckily there wasn’t much people in the park in general, and they didn’t seem to be bothered too much to care what’s going on with three strange people and a well known politician.

Terri listened intently to everything the Colonel explained. How they were weren’t from this universe, that Hank Jr was Shelton’s dad who accidentally came here via the device she had found earlier. She honestly still had questions, and that seemed to be expected from the boys. They were definitely sympathetic, and the Colonel tried to keep everything on an understandable level when he told her about him being an alien, and parallel universes, and all that stuff. She felt like she understood everything for the most part. She felt even more bad now about what happened to Shelton’s dad and she wanted to help them out. 

“How did he find the device then?” Terri asked after they were finished.

The Colonel sighed, still aggravated at the little detail in the story here, “Some motherfucking moron either buried it or left it out in the damn open.”

“I see.” Terri simply said before she took a moment to her thoughts, “You boys are gonna need to know the basic bullet points about this world for context. I assume my counterpart is also different in your world?”

Shooter spoke up, “Yeah she’s a country singer.”

“Then you already have two of them basically, I’m running on the Free Identity Party ticket. Robert is running for the Unified Party.” Terri started before she gestured to the ground with her finger, this time the boys paid apt attention, “This is Canada.”

“We kinda figured that earlier.” Shooter said before Shelton asked.

“Did this used to be America before y’all took over or was there even no America at all?”

“Actually America is the country to the north.”

“So it flipped around here ha .” Shooter chuckled while Shelton googled it for more information, that was pretty damn interesting, “That’s cool.”

Shelton looked at a map which showed America (saved for Alaska) being the same size as Canada in their world, “Alaska doesn’t seem to be part of America here.”

“It ain’t, it’s a part of Russia. Both America and Canada in this world have the same amount of states, err well they have 24 states and we have 24 provinces.” Terri corrected herself.

“That means Hawaii isn’t a part of...umm either one?” The Colonel asked and Terri shook her head.

“Country. Still a monarch I believe. One of the last few.”

“That’s cool though. America has 50 states where we came from.” 

“We should probably also know whether or not our counterparts ain’t some psychopathic serial killer.” Shelton suggested. 

Shooter promptly got out his phone to google his name. That was a good idea, he didn’t even think of that until Shelton brought it up, “Holy mother of shit!” Shooter exclaimed half a minute later. Shelton peeked over at his phone, he thought the worst, but it turned out to be the funny kind of exclamation, “My counterpart a goddamn king front the past!” Shooter laughed out loud for about 2 minutes straight.

Honestly how Shooter reacted caused the Colonel and Shelton to laugh along with him, “He was. His father King Waylon Jennings the First, was the King of the Gaelic Empire, he actually was the first ruler. Your counterpart’s grandpa was the one that finished the main conquering you can say. Took over half of Europe in the 700s, and it lasted well into the 1300s when it all fell apart. Italy was the only one that wasn’t overtaken if I remember history class correctly. Waylon the Great they called him.”

“Wait, what?!!” Shooter exclaimed once again, only this time in a little higher tone and Shelton had to cover his mouth to quiet down the laughter that emitted from his throat. His whole body shook with laughter at how Shooter reacted, and just froze up in shock and amazement.

Shelton also had to make more of an effort to reign in his laughter so he could form words, “Let’s look up my name.” He said as he googled his full legal name. 

Shooter looked over and apparently the results revealed that Shelton’s counterpart was the one that was considered the father of outlaw country, “Ok I’m totally fine with y’all version of me being a country fucking legend.” In all honesty he just hoped for anything other then big time criminal/horrible asshole of a person.

“Did my counterpart ever went by Shooter?” Shooter asked Terri just to be sure if things.

“No. If you go just by Shooter Jennings you should be fine, though if otherwise was the case, you’ll still be fine since some people love to name their kids after famous rulers. And plus Jennings is a common enough surname here. Hell my mom’s maiden name was Jennings.” Terri explained, and Shooter let out a breath of relief. He was sure no one was gonna bat an eye, but on the other hand he didn’t want to cause any more problems of the sort. They already have a big enough headache thank you very much.

In the meantime Shelton quickly googled his dad’s name, “My dad’s counterpart is my counterpart’s father...only he is a classic big time actor. Ok I assume all of his movies tanked badly then.” Shelton retorted.

“You are completely oozing with faith for his acting skills huh?” The Colonel deadpanned lightly with a chuckle as he looked at Shelton.

“Actually our version is considered the greatest actor of his time.” Terri stated.

Shelton took about a minute to feel complete shock and disbelief, before he muttered under his breath, “I need a fucking drink.”

Of course the Colonel heard that, and chuckled under his breath before he stated, “I’m not sure sure if aliens exists in this universe. If not then we can safely assume I have no counterpart here.” The Colonel concluded.

“I’m not sure myself. Would be neat though.” Terri said before she continued about the problem they currently have, “Alright this is obviously gonna be a while to fix this so y’all can stay at my place for the time being.”

“Thank you very much, we can take my Tardis. It’s nearby, and it’s disguised as a Trans Am.” The Colonel said before he led them back to where said Tardis was. 

“We have Trans Ams in this world too, pretty cool car.” Terri said as they walked back down the sidewalk. It was a good thing she decided to dress more incognito today.

“Why I have it be disguised as one, also it’s practical. We can use it to drive around so it’s not like it ain’t functional.”

“Oh cool. Robert has one among his 3 or 4 expensive cars. Lately he’s been driving a more common car to appear ‘humble and one with the common citizen’” Terri rolled her eyes, “He’ll do anything to get re-elected...he was PM before, forced to resign because of a minor scandal. Now that PM Johnson have resigned himself, he sees this as a chance to get back in. He came from a prominent and rich political family.” Terri finished as they reached the Tardis. The Colonel got out the keys and held it out for Terri to take.

“You can drive us to your house. Might be a little faster than you telling me where to drive.” The Colonel laughed lightly and Terri took the keys.

“That sounds good.” Terri went over to the driver’s side as the boys got in. Soon they were on the streets and headed towards the residential part of town, l don’t live in a mansion like Robert does but I do have a nice big enough house.” 

Shooter leaned and watched the scenery go by for a minute but he turned to the Colonel, “Hey Jon, did Kris tell you what alibi they used for the party?”

“Yeah they did. Your mom felt like it was kinda flimsy, but Kris said it worked for now. Course that was before Bocephus got arrested.”

“Sounds like this is messing stuff up in your world too.” Terri chimed in as they stopped at a red light.

“You have no idea, see we were at a party...full of people….people who don’t know about aliens and all this shit. That includes his wife and family save for Shelton.”

“My mom and Kris are handling that end.”

“Wow. I can’t even to imagine how...chaotic that all must be then.” Terri sympathetically said. Why did see feel even more of the urge to go up and chew put that rich boy idiot rival of hers. Is it bad to say she felt more motivated to win this election?

The Colonel nodded, “Yeah. Kris was the guy I talked to earlier.”

“What kinda prison are they taking my dad too?”

“Most likely the Obsidian Max Security Prison which is not exactly...good. It has high tech security. Plus the best guards money can get, specialized trained ones like Robert’s bodyguards and the police group that works for him.” Terri explained then added, “He is gonna spin this to his advantage. He’s done that before.”

“Shit.” Shelton explained dismayed, as he leaned back in his seat, “He never been to prison.”


	4. Chapter 4

By now, Terri just pulled into a driveway and the four got out of the car. Terri moved over to the Colonel to ask something she just thought off, “Hey Colonel I was wondering, could you fix all this by going back in time and preventing Hank Jr from coming over somehow?”

The Colonel sadly shook his head, “Too many complications ma’am. Wish I could but as a Time Lord I say it’s probably best to go on a linear path with this.” 

“Oh. Well don’t worry, I’m gonna do everything I can to help y’all. I was just curious, I would’ve probably tried that myself in a mess like this.”

“It’s alright. I realize that sounds like an easy fix, but you get fixed points time and the butterfly chaos theory.” 

“Oh I see.” Terri said mostly to herself before they resumed the walk to the door, “Oh and feel free to just call me Terri. I think we’re all past the formal stage here.” She said to all three with a chuckle as she opened the door.

Shelton immediately went over to the tv in the living room to turn it on. He wanted to see if his dad being arrested made it on the news already. Shooter walked up behind Shelton when his mom called.

“Hey mom.” Shooter answered and Jessi’s calm voice came out the other end. Thank god interdimensional phone calls work.

“Hey just want to be sure y’all were ok….I mean I know the Colonel there but, well you know me I’m a mother-“

“No no it’s fine. We’re ok, we found someone to help us named Terri. She’s actually a politician, and she wants to helps us as much as she can even...after we clued her in first.”

“Oh that’s great!” A pause filled the air before Jessi continued, she wanted to be sure no version of Daleks showed up unexpectedly but it sounded like everything was fine in that respect. No one will blame her though as she was just being a mother, “We’re staying with Mary for support, me and Kris.”

“That’s nice. I assume everyone else went home?”

“Yep. We’re staying here for two days until Kris has to go to a show and I have to go pay a visit to your brother and his wife down in Texas. But the rest of the family is staying with her for as long as she wants.”

“So what exactly do everyone else believe what happened?”

“He got a little too carried away and got lost somewhere.” Jessi replied, “Kris told me what the Colonel said earlier.

Shooter turned around to face the tv as something caught his eye. It was the the news ticker and the captions that revealed that, yep Terri was right. It had already gone out and they were making it look like Hank Jr was an pro-Terri supporter and had attacked the PM. Shelton eventually turned off the tv in frustration and promptly laid down on the couch as he groaned, “This whole thing being used as propaganda. It’s all over the news here.”

“I should tell Kris that. I’m pretty damn that ain’t what happened exactly.”

“Yeah, Robert is Kid Rock’s counterpart. He is a politician in this universe and I bet Hank Jr thought he was the same old Kid Rock he knew. He went up and didn’t really get the memo ‘til it was too late.”

“He probably still confused about things is my guess, but he is just as smart as your daddy was.”

“Yeah no doubt there. Speaking of Dad, we looked up who they were in this universe.”

“He wasn’t the opposite of the Waylon we knew right? Actually no don’t tell me if he was over there.”

“He was an ancient king of an empire that spanned most of Europe. He is called Waylon the Great.”

“Oh, never mind then. Must’ve been a great king to get that nickname.”

“Yeah. Unfortunately we have to deal with Ritchie the Asshole.” Shooter chuckled. He still found it nuts that his dad’s counterpart was a king of all things. It just sounded contradicting to how his dad actually was. 

The tv by now got turned back on by the Colonel while Terri was looking up things online on a laptop. They had to assess just how far this is being taken. Shooter kept his eyes on the tv as he did a bit ago, seemed like it was on every 24/7 news network now, “Kris just asked me how bad is it? I told him what you said but he wants to know the scope of this.”

“Tell him every news network and online bad.” Shooter said just before the air was permeated with the sudden sound of cussing courtesy of Terri, that was awkward if only cause his mom surely caught some of it, “Terri is as much stressed out about this as Kris is.” He explained a little timid. After all these years he still felt second hand awkwardness if his daughter of a preacher woman mama heard a bunch of sailor level cussing. But he knew she was used to it enough thanks to being in the music scene decades ago.

“I understand why she would be. Kris had to call Hank Jr’s manager and Willie Nelson too. They were gonna record a duet tomorrow in Nashville.”

“Oh hell.” 

“Well I gotta go, I think Mary and Kris are coming back from another look around the neighborhood for Hank Jr. Take care.”

“You too mom.” Shooter smiled as he hung up. Terri just got done on her phone, apparently her campaign manager called her about the news. She let them know she had told a semi (less than semi really) truthful account of what happened in order for him to understand just how wrong the whole story via the news was.

“By the way, so he’ll understand how I knew specific details about this I told him Hank Jr is an old family friend, and you two are friends who decided to come along on a fun little trip down here.”

The Colonel thought it over for a second, before he nodded his approval. That worked well enough. In fact it was pretty much the same sort of alibi Shelton thought of prior, and actually he felt it would be better just to keep it as simple as they could, so this was perfect anyways. Didn’t want to overdo it with something like this, “That’s fine”

“I feel like punching Robert in the face.” Terri commented after a quick pause.

“Me too. Him and our version both.” Shelton attested as he looked at Terri from his position on the couch, “I’ll have you know you have my vote no matter what universe I’m from.”

Terri laughed casually with a nice smile, not everyday you hear someone from another world saying you had their support, “Well thanks Shelton. How come you don’t like your version of I may ask?”

“Eh long story but he is an asshole. Trust me.” 

“He doesn’t hurt anybody and he is a good guy, but he kinda acted like an ass to Shelton in the past.” The Colonel explained a bit more to Terri.

“Well our version won’t hurt anyone either, but he is opportunistic when it comes to politics.”

“That’s to be expected of politicians no matter what world.” Shooter can’t help but make the comment with a small laugh.

“I understand my politics aren’t for everyone but people seemed to view me as a refresh breath of air in the political arena. Must be doing something right.”

“I think you are just based on what happened so far. Thanks again for wanting to help.”

“It’s no problem. Anyone with a heart would help. Let me go order pizza for all of us for dinner.” Terri offered as she dialed a pizza place, “What do y’all want?”

“Cheese please.” Shooter said.

“I don’t care, give me whatever.” Shelton replied and the Colonel had the same answer.


	5. Chapter 5

The next morning the four were at the dining table as they ate some breakfast. Terri’s campaign manager was suppose to come that morning for an impromptu meeting but that was about a hour away at 9 am. 

“Hard to wrap my mind around the fact a little world hopping device caused all this.” Terri commented after 20 minutes of silent but content eating.

“I very much like to kick whoever left it on our Earth in the nuts for doing so. That person is the direct cause of all this.”

“I’m sure he or she didn’t mean too. Probably an innocent mistake.” Terri pointed out and he considered it. He realized he might’ve had a bit of a knee jerk reaction there.

“It’s not Time Lord tech I’ll y’all that.” The Colonel had placed the device on the table last night and it laid there in the ensued chaos before he grabbed it when they went to bed. Now the Colonel had it with him as he looked at it closely in one hand and his screwdriver in the other, “It looks like might’ve came from the future.”

“Ooh futuristic tech always cool.” Shooter commented as he ate up another bite of breakfast.

“Since its a world hopping thing do you reckon it came from another universe? Maybe this one even from the future?” Terri offered.

The Colonel scanned it and it was all quiet for the time being save for the whirring noises, “Not from this universe or ours for that matter. It comes from an universe 2,437 dimension from the left or this one so even further from ours.” The Colonel said after he looked at the info given by the screwdriver. He felt pretty damn amazed to hold onto a piece of tech from an universe that far away.

“Whoever had that could’ve been escaping or they moved to ours, and dump it in either case.” Shelton suggested.

“Well whatever the reason, they, in some way, caused all of this.” The Colonel replied matter of factly. Why with all that evidence that it wasn’t premeditated he still felt like tracking that person down and yelling at them about the damn fucking dangers of leaving a device like this out in the open, or just buried in the open like that rather. He can be an older alien version of a pissed off Kris Kristofferson when he wants to be.

Just then there was a knock on the door, which momentarily froze all four of them in place. Terri was confused as her manager wasn’t supposed to come for another 30 minutes. After a couple of seconds, which felt like a hour, she got up and walked over to the door. She looked through the peephole then opened the door, “What the hell are you doing here Ritchie?!”

Shooter took one look at how sharply dressed up the guy was with his short hair and three piece business suit as opposed to long hair, hat and a cutoff t shirt. Shooter looked back at Shelton and the Colonel with astonishment. “That’s Kid Rock in this universe?! Dude looks nothing like ours.”

“Terezi-”

“Terri.” Terri pointedly corrected him as she let him in before she crossed her arms.

“Terri relax, I’ll be out of here in 10 minutes, I got a meeting I got to go to.. I just thought I’ll wish you good luck.” He began in a contrived cheerful voice complete with a subtle condescending smile.

“I need to say something.” Shelton said as he quickly shot out of his chair and walked over right into this version of Kid Rock’s face. Seems like he still got the height advantage on him in this world so there was some petty caveat to him, “You fucking prickhead!”

Robert stared up at Shelton then began to let out a short laugh, “Wow already with the insults.”

“I know it is a fucking lie, we all do! My dad didn’t attack you and you damn well know that!” Shelton yelled. At least that part he can shout out in the open. Meanwhile Shooter and the Colonel just watched from the table.

“Of course he didn’t but it’s politics. You have to do what you can to get to get elected.” Robert explained, and it was just the casualness of it that aggravated both Shelton and Terri.

“Not by falsely imprisoning someone!” Terri shot in afterwards.

“But how will I be able to make it work in my favor otherwise Terri? Besides the guy sounded like he forgot to take his meds, he kept referring to me as Kid Rock.”

“Well that may be but that doesn’t fucking excuse anything!” Shelton shot back with force behind it verbally and with a pointed finger.

“It’s too late now anyways to counter my claim. Everyone around the world is going to believe my story. Or well, most people anyways, but it doesn’t matter it’ll be enough to secure my place in the polls. ”

“Do you realize you’re putting his dad through emotional anguish!?”

“Yes and I truly feel bad, but if it will help me win the election then….” Robert trailed off leaving the unspoken implication hang over their heads, “Look you know me as well as my family do, I’m not a cold hearted man Terri, I’m not gonna hurt him. I’m just doing business. I’ll release him quietly as soon as this election is over.”

Shelton about now lost all common sense and just wanted to take the asshole prick to Fist City, “You motherfucking-“ Shelton lunged forward, but Terri quickly held him back via an arm across to block his way. If Shelton punched his lights out, they’ll have more of a problem on their hand.

“You should just get the hell out of here and go to your stupid meeting!” Terri glared at him firmly. 

“Almost has another situation on our hands didn’t we? And fine I’m going Ms. Clark, ” He calmly said as he stepped back outside before he looked over his shoulder, “And really good luck to you, thought it’s quite obvious who might be in the winning now. Especially when I play up the victim here in the media.” Robert turned back around and went back to the limo that waited for him.

“Good luck to you too!” Terri yelled after him sarcastically before she shut the door. Shelton took a couple of calming breaths before he asked, “You know him?”

“His parents and my aunt and uncle are friends. We have our own little political rivalry going on. And the whole world here knows we are except for both our families. They still think we’re the same old buddies buddies we used to be as kids.” Terri rolled her eyes.


	6. Chapter 6

Jessi and Kris had taken a little drive aimlessly into the Tennessean countryside, and just pulled up to an out of the place bed and breakfast. They both felt like they needed a breather from everything that happened. Escape everything for a little while. Just the day after everything started, the news of Hank Jr’s disappearance was sent out to the major country music related news sites. On top of that, they had to run with a reason that didn’t exactly put their friend in a good light. They immediately felt bad about that after the news had hit and ran with their cover up lie, but what else could they say that won’t bring up more questions than not. They can’t exactly tell them the real truth. And on top of that, they were faced with the possibility of explaining Shelton and Shooter’s absence. Thought with that they can easily say they left the party earlier to their homes and Shooter went to visit his mom for a few days. 

To say they had felt stressed out since the party (it had been a few days by now) was a bit of an understatement, “I don’t know what to do now Kris. How are we going to fix everything once they come back?! It’s been almost a week already! Hank Jr is going to find everyone in the world thinks he got stupidly drunk at the party and something bad had happened to him. And there will be no way to fix that reputation without revealing to the public the existence of aliens!”

“Jessi, Jess..it’ll be alright I promise. The Colonel will…” Kris trailed off as he pondered for a second as he questioned something in his mind. During this brief moment Jessi took a couple of breaths to calm herself down, “You know, I wonder if he can retcon everything just a little bit. Just enough that Hank Jr never disappeared to another world, and then this mess will never happen.”

“Oh well, we can always ask.” Jessi said as she faced Kris from the passenger seat.

“We should do that.” The two got out of the car and headed towards the door of the bed and breakfast with not to much, just enough for a short stay. It was Kris’ idea for them to escape somewhere temporarily to give themselves a rest before they got back into the chaos of their own world. 

They entered the small quaint looking building and walked up to the front desk, they took care to not look too much like themselves as they didn’t want to be found out, “Do you have two single rooms available? We would like to book 3 days here, we heard wonderful things about this place.”

“Oh great! Glad to hear that. You’re both in luck, we have a room available for you. May I ask for your names?”

“Gabriel Bonhomme and this is my lovely sister Joan.” Kris lied with enough conviction in his voice to make it sound believable. Jessi felt better that he was doing the talking, he has experience in pretending to be someone else after all. Luckily the person behind the desk bought it, and they were soon off to the where their rooms were located, “I would’ve pretended we were married, but I felt like the ghost of Waylon would’ve kicked my ass to the ends of the Earth and back.” Kris whispered with a laugh. That, and it would be less awkward for everyone involved if they went with the sibling angle. Kris should also give himself credit for even remembering the names on the spot enough to quickly put them together for a good enough pseudonym.

Jessi chuckled, “Good choice Kris, where did you get your fake name back there?”

“Ah I just combined two of my character’s names,” Kris paused then added with a laugh, “Why do I get the feeling my Bonhomme character would've gotten a kick out of me doing that haha.”

Jessi laughed along as Kris continued, “Gabriel, on the other hand, will just be really confused.”

“Why you think that?”

“Well, that character is a cyborg in a post apocalyptic world. He’ll be confused to say the least.”

“Oh I see. Well this is fun in an adventurous way.” Jessi said as they arrived at their room. As promised there were two rooms nearby, and they planned to rest in there before they get lunch and take advantage of the hiking paths nearby. 

“Just make sure not to think too long and hard about why exactly we’re taking this break. In fact why don’t we just forget we’re Kris Kristofferson and Jessi Colter.”

Jessi looked at Kris as she tried to get what Kris meant by that, “You mean actually pretend we’re siblings named Gabriel and Joan? As in acting?”

“Yep!” Kris said with a confident smile as Jessi just looked a bit more worried.

“Kris I’m not as good at acting as you.”

“It’ll be alright Jessi, don’t overthink it. You’re not actually in front of the camera and you don’t have to fake it up completely.”

“But acting means I have to fake up everything don’t it?.”

‘Not everything. This is different, you can be yourself, but just pretend you have a different name and that you’re my sister.”

Jessi thought about it for a few seconds as she mulled it over. Eventually she sighed and nodded, “We probably gonna need a little bit of a backstory just to help us out with this.”

“Alright umm, how this our parents were born in Quebec and immigrated to New England in their 20s before they had me and then later you.” Kris suggested, “That’ll work for the two days we’re here.”


	7. Chapter 7

Hank Jr laid down on his bed towards the slate stone wall with his back towards his cellmate. Said cellmate was relatively new, he only started sharing it with him about a day ago. He hasn’t said anything to him beyond a half hearted hello. The cell had on a depressing vibe, and it had been been that way since he got thrown in here. It had been almost a week by his guestimation. He wasn’t completely sure as there wasn’t too much times where he and a bunch of other prisoners got to go outside in the rec yard. But it definitely felt like almost a week passed by. It was a miracle enough of him was kept up the hope enough that he was gonna be rescued sometime soon. It helped that he saw his son on the sidewalk, Shooter, and his friend. What was his name again? Oh right, Jon Hensley he remembered now. 

Or at least three people that looked like them. It didn’t look too likely to him that those three were the versions he knew. For one thing if they were the ones he knew, and this is indeed a different world then how the hell did they get over here in the first place? As far as he knew there was no way to travel to another dimension aside for the apparent bracelet. The bracelet he threw away cause he is a goddamn idiot. The one ticket out of here, and he threw it away cause he thought he was still in the same world, just in a different city.

He did got the feeling he was somewhere that was definitely not Nashville and a world that was not familiar to him at that. Somewhere where everything was topsy turvy. He got the memo that could be the damn case, as unbelievable as it was, when he saw the Canadian looking flag on top of a pole at the front of the prison. This was Washington D.C, shouldn’t it be the American flag instead? He was still confused as all hell of what the fuck happened, but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut after one more try in utter vain of telling the guards that there was some mistake, that he just tried to talk to Kid Rock, and that they were friends a long time. He still felt great confusion over how he got here in the first place exactly. It probably had to do with that damn bracelet he found.

Shit the bracelet! He should’ve kept a hold on it, if he had traveled to another world via that thing then he could escape prison (and this world altogether). He was smart enough not to tell anyone that he might’ve came from a different world. He was just gonna come off as a crazy mentally ill person. That was evident enough and doing that landed him in prison so why even bother trying right? Now the only company he had was a cellmate that got relocated to his cell about a day ago..

The only sound that filled the air of the musty cell was said cellmate writing on a piece of paper at the little desk between the beds. At least his cellmate respected him enough to not bother him unless it was to remind him it was time to get ready for inspection. Apparently they’ll have them once or twice a week. Along with the musty atmosphere, the only source of light came from the small barred window situated up above the desk. According to the weather outside it was cloudy.

“What are you writing?” Hank Jr suddenly asked, and it momentarily caught the other cellmate off guard.

“Oh umm, a plan mostly. A plan to escape. I like to write my plans out on paper to organize my thoughts. Whether its a story or...well this.” The cellmate answered as he kept on writing, “I haven’t told anyone anyone yet, purely in the planning stages.” 

“That’s a good idea.” Hank Jr agreed.

The sound of writing continued on for about five minutes before his cellmate piped up again. He wasn’t to annoyed as he was just happy enough in general to talk to someone, “Hey you want to help. You can escape with us, but if you don’t that’s ok. Just promise you won’t snitch, I can’t be hold accountable to what might happen to you if you do.”

Hank Jr thought on the offer as it definitely enticed him despite the logistics of it. He’ll still be stuck in this world, but at least he’ll be out of prison, “Actually I’ll love to escape this place. There seems to be a lot of security around here though, and there’s that barbed fence outside.”

“Oh yeah don’t worry I’m taking that all into account. Not sure if you caught my name yesterday but I’m Denver.”

Hank Jr had forgotten what his name was so that was nice to know what it was without it being awkward, but conversely he didn’t think he ever told him his, “Call me Randall for right now please.”

Denver paused for a second, “What do you mean for right now?”

“People usually call me Hank or by a nickname I have. Randall is my given name so call me Randall for right now please..” Hank Jr explained matter of factly while not once turning his head around. He didn’t want to go into detail as that meant someone else thinking he had some issues going on. Luckily Denver just took it and didn’t ask any further about it, which was frankly welcomed really at this point of time. Might as well just use a name he doesn’t really go by all that much in this bizarro world if no one recognized him here. Plus he didn’t want to get reminded of the possibility of never being able to go home again.  
.  
“You sure like staring at that wall there.” Denver chuckled, he wanted to try and inject some humor. Can’t survive a 5 year prison stay with having some humor if he had anything to say.

Hank Jr realized Denver was just trying to be nice and maybe he does need a break of staring at the wall. So he finally turned around to sit up on the edge of the bed to who is most likely a man in his late 20s/early 30s at least, “Kid I got a lot on my mind so maybe sometimes I ain’t in the mood to be my usual chatty self.” He hoped that didn’t come off as too rude. Sure he wasn’t in the mood for talking, but he also wanted to be nice. It’s not his fault he is stuck in a confusing world after all.

“Alright.” Denver said as he looked at his paper then at Hank Jr, “Can I ask if you had any experience with planned prison escapes? This is honestly my first time and I hate to screw it up for all of us.”

“Honestly no, but I can take a look at it.’ Hank Jr said as he got up to take a look at the paper, “You got a good start kid but you could be overthinking it here and there.” Hank Jr started off as he sat on the bed, “You’re on the right track with the distraction part..” Thank god the prison here seemed to be run practically the same way as those he remembered from back home.

“Thanks. I’m just not sure what kind of distraction or even how to pull one off.” Denver admittedly.

“Well we can ask for help. I haven’t been long enough to know the layout and everything.”

“I was, 5 years. But there are many ways a distraction could go wrong.”

“Right, we need the right kind of one. Like a riot or something. We still gonna plenty of time to hash this out though, I rather it take 6 months and have it work then 6 weeks had have it not work. And that is coming from someone who is little impatient to get out of here.” Hank Jr joked and so did Denver. But deep down half of Hank Jr just wanted to get the hell out already. 

“I think I am too, but I get what you’re saying. And plus, I want to recruit anyone that wants to escape with us. We’ll go to another country where the feds can’t catch us and assumed a different identity.”

“That is a possibility.” Hank Jr said. Some of the hope inside of him for getting out of here, at least, had grew bigger by now.

Later the next day during rec time he was in the library with a purpose. He wanted to confirm to himself once and for all that he was in another world. The feeling was too great to ignore it completely. Yes the majority was pretty damn sure he was but he wanted it confirmed in some way that he was. 

So here he was with a history book and an world atlas book at one of the tables. It didn’t look to good from the beginning, and in within 10 minutes he felt his heart sunk completely down. That must be record time to feeling downtrodden. Deep down a part of him had wished there was just some weird beer induced dream...somehow. Logically he knew it was, this was definitely a different reality, and he was definitely in prison. And unjustified too at that. Wait, if this was another world, then he shouldn’t be too upset at that Kid Rock looking counterpart, but damn him for insinuating that he was mentally ill. If anything he would like to punch him for that. But that wasn’t the most important part. The important, more pressing part of this revelation was the fact that he was never gonna see his family and friends. He wasn’t gonna wake up with a good morning kiss from his wife, or see the smiles on his kids anymore. He sure as hell wasn’t gonna be able to write music, and doing shows sporadically. And he wasn’t gonna keep being the dad he should be and should’ve been when his first three were kids.

And vice versa, they were most likely missing him or at least everyone else would aside from his son, Shooter and his friend. They obviously would have to have realized he just completely vanished out of thin air in their point of view so they would know the truth. He felt real bad for them, they would also gonna have to keep the truth a secret to the grave lest they get thought of as crazy themselves. Everyone else is going to most likely end up thinking he disappeared and died somehow. That wasn’t a pleasant thought to have so he quickly blanked that out of his mind.

Why did he felt like this was all his fault? He just had to be all giddy and wanting to show them something cool and neat he had found. He should’ve just destroyed that goddamn thing when he had the chance too. None of this shit would’ve happened if he did so. Been awhile since he’d felt this low he noticed.bitterly to himself. But he can’t dwell on it too much, he had to make do with this new set of cards he had been dealt with.


	8. Chapter 8

“Bound by Nothing! Vote for Terri!” Was the repeated slogan a good sized crowd of people were shouting while they pumped their arms in the air.. A speaker out on stage has incited them to chant before he finished up some speech after a brief moment of pause. 

If was a few days later, and the boys were at an outdoor rally in a nearby city to drum up support for Terri. She had the boys come with her on the trail to help out in order for them to have something to do while they wait out the plan to rescue Hank Jr. Part of it or well the better part of it was to play fire with fire and run a subtle smear campaign against Robert and reveal evidence to the public that he indeed lied about being attacked. The end result was to have Hank Jr released from the max security prison and all charges dropped. And of course with Terri winning the election.

Shelton couldn’t help but shout out an impromptu chant within 30 minutes of arrival, “A vote for Terri is a vote for sanity!” He yelled and ended up leading a small group of college aged students in the chant.

Terri laughed as she watched Shelton for a minute as she stood next to the Colonel, “I get the feeling your friend is letting his dislike for y’all version of Robert seep into this.”

“Yeah I think so to haha. Truthfully I think its from an one sided petty desire to be vindictive to Kid Rock, even if he doesn’t know it and never will.”

“Well I’ll take it. It’s not harming anyone I don’t think. No one can tell y’all from another world just from a little old chant like that so I’m not worried.”

“Me either. I think Shelton having a little too much fun with this.” The Colonel teased lightly with a smile. He didn’t really care as it is just that, harmless and won’t affect anything too bad. People would just see an enthusiastic supporter. 

Shooter meanwhile watched the musicians until he saw something that completely fried and shortcurcited his motherboard so to speak,, “Holy hell that’s my fucking brother up there!” Shooter yelled as he pointed to the stage. Or to be more accurate a counterpart of his brother’s.

The two turned around and Terri perked up a bit, “Oh he made it. I wasn’t sure if he was gonna be able too, he had a family emergency a few days ago. He is the biggest country singer right now.” Terri explained. Shooter just stood there as he felt his mind do a million mental error messages of ‘does not compute’.

“How?!?” Shooter shouted in initial disbelief and The Colonel let out some laughter.

“I take it he is not a singer in your world.”

“He is not. In fact he works more behind the scenes. Never wanted to be a musician as I was told.” The Colonel explained as Shooter was still too speechless to even form words.

“I’m gonna go get a closer look.” Shooter finally was able to get a coherent sentence out. The Colonel decided to go with him and they walked out towards the front of the stage. It was pretty interesting to see in the sense that they were in an alternative world, and plus there was good music here..

After 20 minutes of listening to the set, Shooter declared in a scrutinizing way, “Ironically the song is the best cover of that one Bob Dylan song that I’ve ever heard thus far.”

“Hahaha really? And it only took a trip to another world.” The Colonel said with mirth in his voice. 

The singer that looked too much like his version of his brother proceeded to throw a guitar pick into the crowd, and Shooter noticed that a group of people (mainly young college girls) rushed up to vye to be the proud owner of said pick. ‘So he even got fangirls after him….that great.’ he thought. A counterpart of his brother has girls screaming after him like he was Justin Timberlake. But it was funny when you get down to it. Shooter by the end can’t help but just get a good kick out of this. His brother having a counterpart that got screaming fans after him, if his brother knew the secret he would be telling him about this right about now.

After the singer got finished with his set and he walked off, Shelton suddenly strode onstage right up to the mic. After he had spent 3 or so more minutes of extolling the positive points of voting for Terri with of the younger folks in the crowd, he got the bright idea to jump on stage. The Colonel gave Shelton a good hard look that screamed ‘careful….’ as soon as he saw him, thought deep down he didn’t have any real worry about it. He just wanted Shelton to be extra cautious for obvious reasons

“Hey can I have your attention everyone please! I want to just one quick thing...thank you,” Shelton cleared his voice before he yelled at his loudest into the microphone, “Make this place great again! A vote for Robert is a vote for grand idiocy!” Shelton shouted to the crowd’s answering roar of agreement. He proceeded to jumped off the stage in front of Shooter and the Colonel. Shelton put on a grin as he faced the Colonel, “Hey had to do it.” 

“Now I kinda want to go up there and sing something at least.” Shooter said with an enjoyable laugh and the Colonel quickly nixed the idea.

“Probably not a good idea Shooter. Besides it’s time for the video call with Kris and Jessi.” The Colonel said and the three headed to find Terri. He wanted to invite her along to say hi to Jessi and Kris. 

“Hey Terri we’re gonna update our friends back home. Want to say hi?” The Colonel asked.

Terri smiled, she thought that would be fun. She wouldn’t mind meeting them and really, who can pass up the chance to get a glimpse of another world, “Sure.” She agreed and the Colonel led them to the Tardis.

The Colonel turned on the screen and it flickered on before he turned up the video feed which soon connected and revealed Jessi at her Arizona home with a bright smile on her face, “Hey y’all! Kris should be here in a second…” she began as she looked over for a second or two off screen before she faced the screen, “Kris got an phone call from his wife.”

“That’s ok.” The Colonel reassured her, “Umm we wanted you to meet the person who been helping us.” He said as he moved over for Terri to walk on screen.

“Hello ma’am.”

“So you must be Terri then? My son been telling me you’ve been a big help.”

“Oh thanks and speaking of which our counterattack is...working.” Terri hesitated a little bit as she thought over things quickly to give an accurate view on it. She didn’t want to over or underestimate anything with this type of problem, “It seems like a good half of the Internet here is divided over whether or not our Ritchie is lying or not. The ones that say he is, most of them are my supporters.”

“Someone started a #FreeHank hashtag on this world’s version of twitter the other day, and you know how there was some people with phones out when we first saw him arrested? Well some recorded the whole thing and that’s been helping.” Shooter added with a hopeful smile.

“That’s good.” 

“I’m just worried he might hit back hard.” Terri admitted. 

“Sounds like it’s just the usual political going back and forth. Politics can get crazy over here in this world too.” Jessi summarized with a laugh.

“Yeah I just feel bad that Hank Jr got caught up in the crossfire.” Terri replied, “And I wish it would be fixed sooner so they can get back over there but-“ Terri gestured to the boys before the Colonel explained.

“We’re playing the waiting game as to cause the least collateral damage to this world as possible. We could’ve went in for an epic action like rescue at the prison Hank Jr was taken too, but that means real bad people might get accidentally released and thus cause havoc in Terri’s world. I want us to be able to leave with everything relatively unscathed.”

“That sounds like a good plan. You’re in somebody’s house so to speak and you don’t want to leave it destroyed in anyway.” Jessi understood where he was getting at. 

“Exactly. I’m just glad it ain’t Gallifreyan politics.” The Colonel laughed then went on as he looked at Jessi on the screen, “If our Earth and Terri’s Earth were somehow merged, the politics would still be tame in comparison.” 

Jessi and Terri laughed, “I never been there but I take your word for it.” Jessi chuckled. 

“Your house looks pretty.” Terri complimented as she looked behind Jessi.

“Oh thank you. It’s basically out in the desert haha. It’s mighty beautiful out here.”

“May I ask if I can see what the outside looks like?”

“Oh certainly!” Jessi smiles and picked up the laptop as she walked over to the door to step outside. Kris was at the driveway still talking on the phone. Jessi pointed the computer towards the sky and the rocky surrounding, “That was Kris in the driveway by the way. So here it is. Pretty blue sky, no clouds...hot as a oven though.” Jessi joked lightly as she returned the camera to face her.

“It looks so nice there. Would love to take a visit over there if it was possible.”

“There’s probably something similar to this over there I’m guessing.”

“There is, but traveling to another world would be cool.”

“Yeah that sounds an adventure I want to go on sometime.” 

“We can do that sometime Jessi.”

“I’ll probably have to go incognito over there...I don’t want to cause any problem for my counterpart over there.” Terri thought out loud, “I hear she’s a country singer, that’s my favorite type of music.”

“Oh she is. She is a great country singer. I don’t really know her too well but I enjoy listening to some of her music.” Jessi finished just as Kris walked up.

“Sorry about that wife called. She was wondering about the whole Hank Jr case. The whole world save for us thinks he had mysteriously disappeared.” 

“What about me and Shelton? People might be wondering where the hell we are too.” Shooter asked as he wanted to know about that aspect. Sure it wasn’t as complex to try and cover up as Hank Jr, but on the other side he didn’t want people to end up thinking they disappeared. Or worse.

“Oh well that’s easier to cover up fortunately. You are just taking a break and visiting your mom while you Shelton had gone back home to deal with whatever.” Kris informed the boys.

“I’ll take it.” Shelton said with a shrug and Kris nodded alright. It sounded good enough to him.

“When is election day over there ma’am?” Kris asked Terri.

Terri felt apprehensive for only a second before she answered truthfully. Kris probably hoped for say 3 or 5 more days but she also didn’t want to be vague about it, “Two weeks sir. Your friend here wants to minimize the aftermath as possible.” She added as a quick explanation.

Kris sighed semi disappointingly, he wished they would only have to wait for a couple or so more days to be honest but it is what it is. He did thought that was a wise choice however, he didn’t want alternate Earth changed for the worst in the process. 

“People could start to think Hank Jr’s dead or something in two weeks.” Kris lamented/

“I’m sorry about everything.”

“Nah it ain’t your fault Terri, we all just have to deal with it.” Kris assured her before he looked at the Colonel and carefully asked, “Colonel you think you can do a little retconning after this is all finished and we got Hank Jr back? Is it possible?”

The Colonel took almost a minute as to give it some serious thought before he answered. It was indeed possible, but he wanted to do some figuring out to get the precise moment in time to safety do it without fucking up everything, It was safe to say everyone present were a little anxious to hear the reply, “Yeah it is, but I have to do some mathematics first.”

Kris took a sign of relief, “I’m sure Hank Jr will be real happy to hear that too.”

“Yeah I think so too sir.”


	9. Chapter 9

He never thought he would feel even lower than he did when he silently confirmed to himself that he was in a world that wasn’t his own. He mentally berated himself some for thinking it couldn’t get any worse but it did the moment he saw the news on the tv in the man rec room. He felt like some kind of an idiot. The counterpart of his friend was apparently a goddamn leader. Of course it fucking should not come as a damn surprise that a political asshole could falsely accuse someone just to better their chance in the polls. He never once tried to attack him, he just merely thought this alternative Kid Rock was the same one he knew. There was no crime committed there. 

He sat down on the table farthest away from the tv and thus most of the people in the room, although there were two other at a nearby table playing cards. He just mostly kept to himself aside from working on the plan to escape with Denver and three others. He felt a certain type of weirdness seeing the name of the Prime Minister and the appearance. He knew he wasn’t the same Kid Rock that he was used to, but it was just so odd and awkward that his friend’s counterpart was the guy that falsely claimed that he attacked him. And of fuck course he was depicted as a mentally unstable person no thanks to the video of the ordeal being played non stop it felt like. To add insult to injury they kept bringing up the fact that he called him ‘Kid Rock’ in the video much to his chagrin.

And everyone was just so fucking amused by that weren’t they? Everyone and their goddamn dog it seemed like. He can’t really escape the unwanted teasing from the other prisoners so he quickly learned to just tune it out. He just wished everyone would shut the fuck up about that as it didn’t help at all. Even the wardens got in on the joke. Seriously is Denver the only person in the prison that has enough consideration and respect for him to not rub it in his face?

Said person sat down at the table and jostled Hank Jr out of his thoughts, “I don’t get why people here are poking fun at the nickname you called Mr. Ritchie. I mean that was my damn nickname in high school, and everyone wasn’t making fun it then.”

“Hold up that was your nickname?” Hank Jr clarified as he wasn’t sure he heard it right. It was Denver that had the nickname? He wondered how he got it.

Denver looked up from the two pieces of paper he was unfolding and nodded, “I was was a little short for my age back then, and I was in a popular high school rock band that I formed in freshman year. We weren’t very good to be honest and we broke up by early junior year but the name stuck for a while after.” He explained casually, “Nobody thought it was a stupid nickname back then so why now?”

“Different circumstances.” Hank Jr simply said softly after giving it a thought.

Denver considered his answer then nodded a little slowly, “Makes sense but I’m just so used to it so it’s...why?”

“I getcha.” Hank Jr said as he grabbed one of the papers. He wanted to just focus on more important matters at hand. Like what they are planning for, “This here more of the escape plan?”

“Yeah that’s the sketch of the layout for this part of the building. You’ll see there is a couple of possible exits, but I also heard a tunnel we can escape from the basement.” Denver whispered the last part with a calm but giddy voice.

“And where would the entrance be?”

Denver paused then looked a little discouraged, “Other side of the wing here.”

“So all we have to do is create a distraction. Like a riot.”

“I’m not sure how we even start up a riot. Or at least a good enough one.” Denver replied just as another member of this little escape planning group sat down at the table between them.

“Talking about the plan?”

“Yeah we are Liam. Do you know if there is a tunnel that we can escape from the tunnel?” Denver asked.

“I believe there is one and that would be the best way to escape. Less chance of getting caught but at the same time I don’t want to raise any hopes. Other criminals have escaped via that tunnel in years past and some got caught, others didn’t.”

“I’m willing to take that risk. We just need to create a good enough diversion.” Hank Jr pointed out.

“And the key to the basement door. Me and Ira can handle that. And Ira may also have an idea of the specifics on the kind of diversion too.” 

“Sweet!” Denver said with a friendly smile.

____________________

Shelton browsed the aisle in the music/game store aimlessly, not really feeling the same kind of wonderful excitement as Shooter did. He was all over the place obviously enamored with the fact that he was in a store in an alternative universe. This meant discovering music or games that never existed in the first place in back home. He got a kick out of seeing an album of Bob Dylan’s that he knew never happened. And he knew his discography well enough that this particular one didn’t exist to. But it did here so he wanted to buy it.

The album would have to stay in the Tardis/his computer and he would have to be careful to not let it slip onto the very public internet but he didn’t care honestly. New music!

Meanwhile the Colonel noticed Shelton had kept to himself in the metal/punk section, he looked down to say the least as opposed to Shooter. While Shooter looked like a kid in a candy store, Shelton was lost in his own world. Like he had something heavily on his mind that weighed him down, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out why, “Hey dude.”

“Hey. They have a couple of artists that don’t exist back home. Or at least they ain’t punk singers but here they are.”

“I ain’t gonna stop you from buying it. It’s not gonna cause anything catastrophic to the time space whatever of our universe.” The Colonel reassures him as he looked at the albums on the rack.

Shelton thought for a minute before he grabbed one of the albums, “I’m getting this solely cause of the album art.” He admitted with a light sheepish laugh.

Several seconds passed before the Colonel reassured him with full determination in his voice, “We’ll rescue your dad sooner than later .”

For all his issues that he had with his dad in the past (and some he still has) the familial love he had for his father never diminished to the point where he doesn’t want him in his life. He enjoyed hanging around with him from time to time like when they go hunting or fishing and cared enough about him to worry if he is ok, “I ain’t calling my dad a completely wuss or anything, can handle himself just enough in prison to the point where I’m not worried he is gonna get punched up every two seconds.” Shelton started as a prelude, the unspoken ‘but’ hung in the air as he paused for a second. He definitely didn’t want his anyone to think he didn’t have faith in Hank Jr which is far from the truth, “But the fact that he is over here in another world and to his perspective he probably thinks he is stuck forever or something and he doesn’t know...he doesn’t know what you are. I mean yeah he noticed us on the sidewalk but to him we could be counterparts to the people he knows.”

And that there was definitely a valid source of worry. The Colonel just felt nervous about how he should say his reply. Damn it he was a Time Lord just like the Doctor he had read about time to time. Shouldn’t he have an idea already on the best thing to say, “I, well, I mean he probably realized by now or have an idea at least of how he got here, he probably has hope for a rescue.”

Shelton gave a semi weary sigh, “I doubt that. He doesn’t know that aliens exist, he doesn’t know space and time travel is possible. To him, he is separated from everyone and everything that he loves. Except maybe hunting and fishing,” He amended before he finished his train of thought, “To him, his whole life has fucking crashed and he has to start anew! So what frame of reference does he have to give himself hope that he ain’t gonna be stuck here for the rest of his life?! Dude probably feeling pretty damn devastated.”

Shelton pauses then signed apologetically, “I’m sorry I’m overthinking it….I’m just worried about him.”

“No, no dude that’s...that’s very understandable.” The Colonel replied just as Shooter walked up to join them all excited.

“Hey Jon, Shelton, you know that text game I made a year ago in our world? Well it’s a fucking honest to God console version in this world!” Shooter exclaimed happily as he showed him what appeared to be a Nintendo 3DS game.

“Oh awesome dude!” The Colonel took a close look at it, “This is what I love about alternative worlds you see cool shit like this.”

“Yeah totally! I’m buying it.” Shooter said while he also showed him the other item in his hands, “Oh and guess what else I found?” He said with a giddy grin on his face.

The Colonel took a closer look then his widen with amazement, “Is that an Elvis cd?!”

“Yeah man! Complete new music that doesn’t exist in our world.” Shooter said as the Colonel gave back the game and took the cd, “Check the date it was released that how I realize it definitely has to be new music that don’t exist in our universe.”

“198…” The Colonel began to read off the copyright date before he was rendered speechless. He looked at the album for a couple of more seconds as he felt his fanboy glee show through, “This means Elvis is alive in this universe, or at least didn’t die at the same time as we know it…”

“Yep!” Shooter smiled, he knew that was one of his favorite Earth performers.

The Colonel stared at Shooter for a second before he let his fanboy side completely overtake him as he suddenly made a beeline for the aisle where the Elvis albums were found. Shooter and Shelton chuckled good naturedly, “I knew he’ll got nuts over that haha.”

“Yeah, I also noticed some albums by your brother’s counterpart over there.” Shelton pointed towards the other side of the store.”

“It’s tempting to buy them just for curiosity sake.” Shooter said as he and Shelton walked over to the country music section.

Shelton picked up the album and gave the track list a look before he let out a sudden laugh. Apparently the counterpart had a familiar song listed on the back. Shelton got his attention and handed it to him, “Dude look at the back there.”

Shooter gave a curious look at it right before it turned into that if midly scandalized as soon has he saw the song titled ‘Outlaw You’, “What the hell, hey that my song! No way a counterpart of my brother’s can sing it better than me!” Shooter mildly boasted half seriously before he gave it another glance then back at Shelton. To be fair he hadn’t actually listened to it first. 

“I’m gonna buy it and see for myself.” Shooter declared, curiosity overtook him just as the Colonel called out to them.

“We should probably buy our stuff and go, it’s almost time to meet up with Terri.”


	10. Chapter 10

The explosion was just fucking sugary sweet icing to an already well executed plan so far. It was a great idea along with the riot he helped Liam instigate. Most, if not all, of the guards were drawn over to the main rec room, and the outside yard where said explosion took place. He and Liam put on a damn good act to get the riot going apparently. He was surprised and so was Liam for that matter. Neither were really actors so no one can’t really blame them for admiring the huge fight that went on as they stood on the sideline momentarily befuddled that it actually worked!

“And I thought I was doing as good as a pile of rocks.” Hank Jr said with pleasant surprise in his voice..

“Yeah I thought I was doing a shit job of it myself to be honest.” Liam said a second before he motioned at Hank Jr along the way they were headed in, “Come on, let's get going, Denver and Ira should meet us at the basement door.”

“Right.” Hank Jr followed along with Liam down a small secluded path down a forgotten hallway and two before they reached a room that had the entrance to said basement. There as noted earlier the other two of their little group were there waiting. Ira took the key out and quickly opened it. 

“Our ticket to freedom boys. I know the exit in the tunnels follow me.” Ira stated as he first went down the stairs followed by the others. Hank Jr had to admit to himself that it had been a long time since he felt his adrenaline pumping in his veins this much. He can heard his heart thumping in his chest as he was anxious to just be free again no matter what world this was. He was not gonna let some damn lookalike of his friend keep him imprisoned on trumped up charges.

He kept up the pace with the others as he ran through the underground labyrinth. So far so good, the only sounds he care hear is their shoes that would hit the small puddles of water and ground as they ran through the damp and dingy tunnel. The lack of light didn’t help much either but it would be all worth. He won’t be back home and there is no way he is going to get back to his world by now but at least he can start anew as a free man. Got to look at the positives right? 

Who the hell is he kidding? It hard to look at the positives in a situation like he is in. Hank Jr pushed any kind of thoughts out of his mind as he is focused on just getting out right now. Everything was going smoothly so far up until they reached an intersection in the tunnels and they suddenly heard distant footsteps. Telltale sounds of the boots the guards tended to wear. Shit that ain’t good. It was only about a minute that the four stood frozen in fear. It only had to be some of the guards since Liam took care to make sure the door will close in after them locked. Damn it.

“What do we do?!” Denver panicked. Luckily the guards were still far away enough.

“Split up!,Be harder to catch all of us.” Hank Jr said quickly and the boys spared no moment to mull over if they should go in pairs or not. However while Liam and Ira ran down two separate tunnels, he and Denver ended up stuck together.as they sprinted like they were in the Olympics down one of the tunnels. After ten minutes they came across the light in the tunnel in the form of a ladder that led up to a manhole. Luckily the guards were still far away enough and they were able to get outside and put the cover on without getting caught.

Hank Jr, and frankly Denver too, wanted to take a quick moment of rest. He wasn’t in the best shape as he had a bit of a beer gut thing going on. The best stamina in the world he did not have. Denver maybe, kid looked like he was more fit than me, plus he was younger. They two were currently on the side of the road with grassy fields on either side. Denver had his hands on his knees as he took a couple of breaths before he faced Hank Jr, “We have to keep going.”

“Roger that. I just don’t know anywhere we can hide. This was my first time down here.” Hank Jr quickly amended.

“That’s alright. There is an abandoned country home up this way, we can stay there to rest up before we figure out what to do next.” Denver stated as he pointed up the road. He felt bad that apparently Hank Jr’s first trip down here had to be marred by getting caught in a politician’s scheme.

After a hour or two of nothing but running and jogging, they made it to said abandoned house. Luckily said house was deep enough in the woods to be obscured enough for anyone to not take first notice. That was good enough for now, they planned to move on after they take a short rest, “You ran pretty damn good for an older guy.” Denver said as a compliment as he crashed down on the couch on next to Hank Jr.

“Thanks, I think it was the fact I didn’t want us to get caught kept me running.”

Denver laughed lightly, “Same here.” The two leaned back on the ratty old couch as they took in the air of freedom. Albeit air filled with the scent of an old home slowly being overtaken by the plants and vines as furniture and clutter laid there dilapidated for what who the hell knows, but freedom nonetheless.

“Is there any particular place you wanna go to?” Denver asked after about 5 minutes passed. He started to think of a destination they could go to one, get away as far as possible and two, they could easily adopt another identify if they had too without people being none the wiser.

Hank Jr looked over at Denver, he could say Nashville but given the whole different universe thing the Nashville in this world won’t be the same one he remembered. From what little he was able to look up this version of Nashville was still the capital of country music and everything, but at the same time it won’t exactly be his Nashville, “I don’t care actually...anywhere is good. You?”

Denver thought for a second before he replied, “Same.”

“Well then we have to figure out direction to go to then.” 

“Yeah. We can just wing it. I never really stay in one place too long anyways.” Denver admitted and Hank Jr turned to him, a little curious now.

“Really? I would’ve guessed otherwise with maybe a kid or two.” Hank Jr chuckled good naturedly with a friendly smile and Denver laughed along as he shook his head.

“Haha nah. Actually I’m single and been that way since I want to say a year and a half before I got arrested.”

“What for?”

“Petty car theft and I was an idiot to think a home robbery would benefit me in any way. I got sucked into a group with who I thought were my friends, but they left me hanging after I tripped and fell as I tried to get away.”

“Oh yeah. Well I got in because apparently I attacked Mr. Ritchie.” Hank Jr teased which gave both of them a laugh and a smile.

“Yeah I’m sorry he did that do you by the way. I kinda had a feeling it was some bullshit claim cause he had pulled that kind of shit before plenty of times.”

“Oh? Really?”

Denver nodded, he just figured the man next to him was one of those who just haven’t really cared enough to follow politics all that closely in recent years. Which he didn’t blame him for, “Oh yeah, he’ll do anything but actual harm if it would benefit him in some way.”

“I see.”

“Yeah most people I’ve come across are tired of him. But he stills has a good sized fanbase.” Denver stated before the air was filled with silence for several seconds. Hank Jr leaned back and started to think about his family as well as friends. He knew objectively there was no going back but it was still hard to wrap his idea around the fact he wasn’t gonna see them again for the rest of his life. 

“Hey you’re alright?” Denver sudden question caught him a bit of guard as he was focused on his memories of his loved ones. At least he still had those. Hank Jr looked over at him a bit confused, “It just looked like you had something on your mind.” Denver explained a bit awkwardly.

Hank Jr was quiet for a second, he didn’t want to go into too much and have  
Denver think he is crazy. It was nice having someone to talk to and he didn’t want to lose that. But he wanted to be honest at the same time time as well, “Oh uhh. Well I’m fine I just…..was thinking about my family and how I miss them already.”

“Oh well at least you have some still. I don’t really have a family. I mean I did and they were good enough parents for the most part….until they abandoned me after winning some lottery money. Luckily I was 16/17 when that happened, so I was able to get enough fine without needing parents still.” 

“Well they shouldn’t done that. I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“No it’s fine. Gave me the chance to learn how to fend for myself sooner rather than later.” Denver paused for a second then added with a small chuckle, “Though to be fair stealing ain’t the best way, but you do what you can to survival.”

“Well still they shouldn’t abandoned a kid just cause they suddenly got rich.” 

“I agree but it is what it is, I accepted my harsh reality pretty damn quick a long time ago.” 

“I suppose that’s good then.” Hank Jr wasn’t sure if he completely accepted the fact he is stuck in another universe for the rest of his life.


	11. Chapter 11

It was the day after the final debate, and the small group had just left the fancy hotel. They were headed to the Tardis to connect with Kris and Jessi back home to play catch up. They were about halfway there in the parking lot when they heard a familiar voice. Terri sighed a bit exasperated as Robert walked over. The boys weren’t exactly too happy either, especially Shelton. In fact if it wasn’t for the fact that people were there, and that it will backfire in his face so fast he’ll find himself in jail the next second, he’d punch him. Hard.

Of course there would be a subtle condescension in his tone, “Hey Terri just wanted to congratulate you on the debate last night.” Robert started just before he stopped in front of Terri.

“Uh huh? And I suppose you’re just saying it cause you think I lost the debate?”

“What?! No no I just wanted to show good sportsmanship.” Robert replied contrively and Terri rolled her eyes.

“You never do unless you think you’re winning something by a long shot.” 

Robert looked at her then sighed, “Well fine, I guess I’ll just cut to the chase then, according to the polls after last night’s debate I’m in the lead.” He stated with a hint of boastfulness in his voice. Terri took out her phone to look up his claim.

“Only by 2 points. And this is by the news network that tends to be obviously bias towards you.” Terri corrected him and Robert scoffed.

“So?! Clearly this means the public still favors me as a PM.”

“Not really. I mean you are in the lead, but not much. It’s still anyone’s game.” Terri answered calmly before she clicked on another result. 2 points ahead is nothing. Of course Robert would act like even a small lead like that meant otherwise After a moment of silence, Terri started to chuckled just loud enough to catch Robert’s attention. She found a different poll that was posted on Twitter by an international news site. This of course meant they were going to get a different result and said results were curious to say the least. 

Robert felt annoyed as he looked at Terri, “What’s so funny?”

“This poll here, guess who is in the lead according to the internet.” Terri gave him her phone so he could get a closer look. Terri was in the lead by 18 points. Robert just looked at it in disbelief for a few seconds before he looked back at Terri.

“What!?!” Robert loud reaction caused the other three behind Terri to laugh under their breath.

“The public has spoken.” Shelton added with a laugh and Robert shot him a glare.

“Oh you shut up.” Robert shot back as he gave the phone back to Terri as he looked at all of them then quieted down some so other people around wouldn’t overhear him, “Well no matter. I still have enough gullible voters eating out of my hand. Your inefficient evidence is not gonna work Clark!“ Robert pointedly stated before he faced Shelton again, “I should thank your daddy really, if it wasn’t for him then I wouldn’t gotten his far. Such a confused old man.”

Shelton clutched his fists by his side, he was surprised a little at how he still had restraint at this point as Robert continued with a facetious smile, “Pity really, I feel sorry for him.”

“You’re a piece of shit! My dad never attacked you and you fucking know it!” 

“Hey I just did what I had to do to push the narrative into my favor. If it’s any consolation, I wished this whole thing played out differently.” Robert protested with a go at persuasiveness.

Shelton, however, didn’t take it anymore. Just, how the fuck dare someone put his dad in jail on false charges, and use him just to garner votes. Much less someone who happened to be a counterpart of his dad’s friend. That fact alone must be fucking with his mind right now. Shelton’s face grimaced with anger once again, and made the move forward to punch him only to be held back by both Terri and the Colonel.

By now Robert had his hands in his pockets as he walked to the limo waiting for him, unaware of what happened.


	12. Chapter 12

The pair sat in the abandoned truck they had stolen earlier in the day (somehow they both managed to hot wire it), Hank Jr was in the driver’s seat and Denver was next to him. It was nighttime and they were parked on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. Well maybe not complete nowhere as they were only 2 or 3 hours from Washington DC, but they were in a secluded enough area that they felt safe. What’s the likely chance of the feds or anyone for that matter discovering them in some old out of the way ghost town? They didn’t know for sure but they banked on news of their escape being in the news by now as it been more than enough hours already...

“I’m...I’m not sure where we go exactly to lay low.” Denver confessed after he looked up at Hank Jr. He’d been gazing at a map for a destination for the past 10 minutes while Hank Jr just leaned on the wheel and stared out into the sky.

“Oh it doesn’t really matter to me. Just pick someplace far away.” Hank Jr replied.

“Perhapes the next country over? We’ll probably have to find a way to sneak through the border.”

Hank Jr thought over Denver’s suggestion, yes going over the border who heighten the chance of them getting away but on the other hand he didn’t want to get into any real trouble. Sure he felt numb and indifferent right now about his new life in the new universe but he didn’t want to get any real trouble if he can help it. Prison is something he did not want to go back to. In his own universe or any other, “Nah let's do that as a last resort kid.” Hank Jr spoke in a monotone like voice. He felt pretty numb when it came to life in a new universe. Though he will say befriending Denver is a positive. 

“Alright.” Denver went back to the map, he was trying to search for a town that might be small enough yet big enough where seemed like everybody kept to themselves. He felt going to a town where everyone practically knew each other might be a little risky. That is if they are now on the news. They had to be right? Or at least Hank Jr since it was Ritchie who falsely imprisoned him the first place. Shit, he might get recognized more easily than him he realized. 

Meanwhile Hank Jr looked out into the night sky. It was partly cloudy and he can see the stars peeking through here and there. The moon however was hidden behind a cloud but the moonlight was enough to cast everything around them in a serene glow. He didn’t really take noticed of how said glow seemed to be a little brighter than back in his own world. Frankly it just reminded him he wasn’t in his home universe and thus made him feel lonely in a sense. He literally doesn’t have anyone in this world except for Denver. And even then he opted to not tell. Maybe someday in the future, he’ll see. 

When the clouds finally parted 5 minutes later the source of the moonlight came out and it caught Hank Jr off guard. The moon appeared to be bigger than what he remembered. Way bigger in fact so much so it caught him off guard when he first took in the billently white and light blue gas looking planet. Actually scratch that it looked like it could be a planet due to the size took up in the sky which could accurately be described as between the size of Uranus and Saturn. 

“Holy fucking mother of hell!” Hank Jr swore out loud as he shot up while he clutched the wheel with both hands simultaneously. His sudden exclamation startled Denver which caused him to abandoned the search for a place to settle down. 

There was something in the way he exclaimed that told him he wasn’t saying that as a joke. It sounded to genuine and he actually looked quite shocked. He wasn’t sure what to make of it, he wasn’t no Sherlock Holmes kinda person. Unless he wanted to go the sci fi route, “Its pretty tonight ain’t it Randall?” He just opted to go with a generic comment as he took a look at the planet. Like Hank Jr who didn’t want people to think he was crazy for his own aforementioned reasons, Denver didn’t want to come off that way if he made his (admittedly) off the wall theory as to why his new friend reacted like if he never saw this before.

Hank Jr was only able to mustered out a short sentence, “Y...yeah it is. It just the size...goddamn it's bigger than what I remember,” He uttered the last part out before he realized and thusly blushed in sudden awkwardness. He hadn’t meant to do that and let something slip that could clue someone in that he wasn’t from here. His mind quickly ran a mile a minute with various things he could say to cover that little mistake up.

“What do you mean by that? You’ve said that like you ain’t seen Ionea before.” Denver paused as the two faced each other in the truck. His eyes widen a bit as it dawned on him, “I don’t mean to be rude here but are you an alien?” It was the only reason he could think of why Hank Jr reacted the way he did.

Several seconds passed and Denver was starting to feel worried that he overstepped his boundaries. He was about to apologize when Hank Jr answered as he leaned back and faced the road ahead, “Might as well be.” He sighed solemnly said as he crossed his arms. Why the hell couldn’t this version of Earth have the same kinda moon in common with his Earth? Now it was just gonna serve as a giant nightly reminder that he was in a different reality. What a way to make him feel more lonely now.

“What do you mean might by that?”

“If I tell you then it’s liable to make you think I’m crazy kid.” Hank Jr cautioned him. 

“Well...I’m a huge sci fi geek. If it’s anything sci fi stuff taught me, its to have an open mind.” 

“So that’s why you ain’t freaking out as much as you probably should.” Hank Jr teased with a friendly laugh that soon faded away.

“I guess so yeah. Plus I say you’re nice and that’s good enough for me.”

“I appreciate that.” 

“So what kinda planet you’re from?” Denver asked calmly but with an eager smile.

“Actually I’m from a different sort of Earth.”

“Oh? You mean like a different universe.” 

Hank Jr nodded softly, “I don’t understand how I got here exactly but it was from a stupid watch...thing I threw aside right after I got here.” He still felt like an idiot for throwing away the one damn thing that could’ve had a good chance of him getting back home.

“Like an interdimensional travel device?”

Hank Jr shrugged, “Hell if I know, all I know is I’m stuck here for the rest of my life. I had me a wife, kids and a real good career.”

“Were you ironically a police officer?” Denver teased with a friendly smile which caused Hank Jr to laugh a bit out loud. That would be ironic indeed.

“No I’m a country singer, or was I suppose.”

“That’s cool.” Denver gave it a thought as he looked at him then faced the road in front of him.

Hank Jr smiled, it felt like he was given a break for the first time since he landed in this version of Earth, “Yeah, lots of good friends too. I miss them all terribly.” He states before he changed the subject a bit, “The moon ain’t as big in my world and it orbits Earth. Plus it’s dull and gray.”

“I bet it looks pretty though.”

“It is. And whatever this is called is pretty too.” Hank Jr gestured to the planet before them.

“Ionea? Yeah it’s a gas planet.” He supplemented as more of an afterthought.

“I usually go by Hank mostly and Bocephus back home. Randall just my first name.”

“That’s cool. People usually use Den as nickname for me.” Denver stated then went on to a question, So “Do you think there is any possibility of you going back? I mean apparently there’s world hopping bracelets, maybe you accidentally grabbed a prototype or something. Then someone can use it again ”

“Thing is our tech is about the same as yours. We don’t have anything like that normally so if there is some hidden tech the public don’t know about then I don’t know.”

Denver nodded a bit, “Neither do we.”

The two sat in a weird mixture of melancholic but comfortable silence for the next 5 or so minutes, “You want to know the damndest thing?” Hank Jr offered, his voice was low and tinged with sadness.

“What?” 

“I could’ve sworn I saw my oldest and a couple of his friends while I was in the police car.”

“Maybe it's...them? From your world somehow..” Denver suggested optimistically. He wasn’t sure how they came over then if both worlds have the same level of tech but maybe, but he wanted to be positive for him. Though deep down he admitted he would be sad to see a newfound friend leave but happy at the same time as it meant Hank Jr would finally be home to his old life. It will be a bittersweet thing once it happened, but it would be selfish for him to want him to stay. Conversely he didn’t mind going to the other world with him. He didn’t have anything that tied him to this world and plus he wouldn’t have to worry about prison anymore.

“I...desperately want to believe that, but I don’t. How else would have they gotten over here? Could be your world’s versions of them or most likely just people who looked like them..”

“Maybe,” Denver simply said as he faced Hank Jr, “You look like an old actor here. His name is Randall too, Randall Hank Williams.”

Hank Jr chuckled, “That’s my full name. Man I can’t act worth shit.” He finished with another laugh. It wasn’t hard to deduce that this actor guy was his counterpart in this world.

“I don’t think you have to worry about being confused with him, you look similar yet just about different enough. If that made any sense.” Denver said a little unsure of himself at the end.

“Nah I got it. He must’ve not fallen 400ft off a damn mountain then.”

Denver paused for a second before the implication of that sentence became clear to him and his eyes widen a bit as the implication set in, “Wait you have?”

“Yep. Slipped and fell off the side, cracked my head open. Took a while to recover.” Hank Jr could go into more detail but he didn’t felt up to the task at that moment. Most of the reason was that he was tired and wanted to sleep soon. The two ended up with their backs against the seat as they enjoyed the moment. This area should be good enough for them to get some rest. The stars still shone brightly in the night sky. Or at least in the spaces between various clouds. 

It was like this for at least 5 minutes, nothing by comfortable silence as they were entranced by the scenery and let it lull them to sleep. Hank Jr was just about asleep when he noticed something new, something discerning. In the rearview mirror there was a sudden flash of light. The kind of light that only came from a vehicle This brought him to full alert mode, was that a police car? Or maybe this was some other criminals who decided to come up and do something illegal. Either way he didn’t want them to be on the wrong end of a gun.

“Shit I can’t tell if its a police car or not!” Denver cried out in a panic as he looked behind out the back window. He too had let his body relax before he noticed Hank Jr grabbing the wheel again. He quickly found out why. Denver looked back at Hank Jr, “Let’s not take any chances dude let’s go!”

Hank Jr thought that was the best idea, he did not want to take any chances. It was, unfortunately, more of a was a lose, lose situation, if it was the police then they were fucked. If it was someone looking for trouble well while there was a chance they could be friendly enough to leave them alone, however, they could still be fucked. So with that reasoning in mind, Hank Jr floored it.


	13. Chapter 13

Shelton and Shooter were in the recreation room of the Tardis while the Colonel was in another room nearby. The two were playing some future first person shooter game (pretty much just a future version of Combat Arms). They have gotten the news the other day that about four people escaped the prison, one of them being Hank Jr. It was suffice to say that they were all happy he is alive. Now all they had to do was to track him down. When the time is right of course, they first wanted all the feds off his back and all the charges dropped.The election was only a day away and Robert’s claim that he was attacked crumpled down since they ran into him. It was getting harder and harder to keep a hold with his alibi. By now it was wearing thin and it was even obvious to any non Time Lords that Terri was going to win.

“I’m still impressed that dad escaped dude, and relatively quick too haha,” Shelton mentioned with pleasant enthusiasm as he faced Shooter and admitted with a happy smile, then back at the big tv screen, “I mean not that I didn’t have any doubts but….I was just worried for him.” He sincerely finished.

“I totally getcha..” Shooter said as the currently round of the game just ended. He then thought maybe the Colonel would want to join in on a few rounds. He and Shelton knew he was still working on the best point of time to do the retcon, “Wanna see if Jon wants to join us?”

“Sure, how long was he working on the retcon anyways?” Shelton wondered. Time went by as more of a blur since the two started playing the game. All he remembered was the Colonel telling them that he’ll join once he got finished. Or finished for the day at least.

“Since we got in here so almost 2 hours.” 

In the aforementioned other room sat the Colonel at a desk surrounded by a few opened notebooks. He had been writing out formulas and other other complex mathematical equations in order to ensure that the best possible outcome will only happen when he does said retcon. He is happy that it wasn’t a fixed point in time, otherwise there would be nothing he can do, but this he can work with. 

“Hey dude.” The Colonel lifted his head up from the current notebook in front of him to see his friends walk in, “Want to join us at Combat Arms?” Shelton asked.

The Colonel let out a deep sigh, “I really love too but...I’m so close, don’t want to give up now.” He admitted, “I’m down to within 30 seconds of the sweet spot.”

“That’s really awesome. I think that calls for a break.” Shooter stated as Shelton looked at one of the notebooks, “You’ve been at this long enough for today dude.” 

The Colonel looked up at Shooter obviously at a dilemma. He truly did wanted to get up and play video games, but he also wanted to have the peace of mind that he has the exact time down to the second for the retcon that won’t sent him drinking out of guilt if something became fucked up down the line, “I know but...I want to get this figured out sooner than later. I don’t want to pick some random spot and then two years later the world is taken over by an evil group of aliens.”

Shooter and Shelton knew that Time Lords can see all possible timelines with conundrums like this, “Right that’ll be good haha,” Shooter chuckled then stopped for a second,”Is that the kinda timelines you’re seeing?” 

The Colonel nodded softly before Shelton added as he looked over a notepad. It was filled with timestamps with notes after it that said either “no” or “could work”. Currently there seems to be more no’s by a good margin, “I’m assuming that explains some of these.”

“Yeah, most of them would just end up being some kind of hell in some way or another.” The Colonel glanced at Shelton before at both of them in general.

“What’s that about then?” Shooter asked with a light laugh after he noticed one lone entry marked “lol”.

“Hank Jr becomes president in that timeline.” The Colonel smiled amusingly.

“Oh...that’s just what we all need, more politics.” Shooter deadpanned as he rolled his eyes as Shelton laughed in mild disbelief, “I got enough seeing it up close over here and this ain’t even our world! No offense to this world’s version of Terri. She’s been nothing be nice and helpful.” He added after a moment. He did imagined Hank Jr being president would be interesting.

“Right, I getcha.”

“I don’t even know which one of us wants to punch this world’s Ritchie more, me or her.” Shelton commented with a small laugh.

“I can see you both tag teaming against him in a wrestling match.” Shooter said with a light hearted laugh.

“Ha!”

The Colonel laughed along with Shooter, before he continued on with a casual tone and a light amazed laugh, “You won’t believe how many damn timelines I saw in my head of hostile aliens eventually invading.”

“I’m guessing enough to give you a headache?” Shooter asked as he chuckled lightly.

“Mild one but yes. There was equally just as many timelines where one of our lives become fucked up. One of the more fucked up ones is where the Master took over as President of Gallifrey and decided to try and take over Earth.”

“Who’s the Master?” Shelton asked.

“Another Time Lord, he’s the Doctor’s nemesis actually..”

“Do you have one?” Shooter asked out of simple curiosity. In a way it would be cool if he had an arch nemesis. It would be kinda like one of those cartoons he watched as a kid or a classic superhero story.

“Nope. Probably a good thing overall, but it would be funny if I had one.” The Colonel admitted with a slight laugh. 

“I would offer help but obviously I can’t see different timelines.” Shooter said apologetically then thought for a moment, “I still think that power is cool.”

“It has its pros and cons. I find if I look at too many timelines at too short a time, then I would get a headache.” The Colonel explained as he stood up. He felt like a break was well deserved, give his brain a break and all that. Even Time Lords are prone to feeling burned out from long periods of work. Or at least he does in his experience.


	14. Chapter 14

The bar looked and felt the same as some of the honky tonk/dive bars back home. It was definitely nice to not be reminded that they weren’t in another universe 24/7, not that Shooter and Shelton were having any issues with it, but wasn’t it nice to not have it be rubbed in your face all the time? Really, only thing after several days the only thing Shooter and Shelton still have some trouble with is the fact that this Earth revolved around a gas planet.

The Colonel on the other hand, didn’t really looked fazed one bit. He hasn’t actually ever since they spend the first night here. The bar they were all at had an outside area and live music poured from inside as well as some of the smoke. Right now it was just the Colonel and Shooter while Shelton was inside with a group of supporters for Terri. It was Election Day night so that explained the crowd of people inside who chanted a slogan every so often, usually sometime in between music. Of course given that they were outside. There was still people outside, but there wasn’t a whole lot compared to inside.

Shooter stared at the gas planet in the sky while the Colonel looked at his phone, unfazed by the juxtaposition that had risen up from the horizon. It was a couple of minutes of casual silence before Shooter looked at him, “Jon I’m not sure I can fully wrap around the idea that there is an Earth,” Shooter pointed towards the ground as he leaned in. There were people behind him and he didn’t want anyone to overhear, “That revolves around a gas planet. I mean, not to sound narrow minded in anyway. I’m just, its, it’s still just, surreal to me.” Shooter admitted, “How are you acting like...we’re all from this universe instead?” He asked for lack of a better way to put it.

The Colonel chuckled lightly. That was one way to put it he guessed, it all just came down to what they were used to seeing all their life, “I’ve traveled to other dimensions more radically different then this before. Like, for example, there is a dimension where language and communication runs the universe instead of matter and all that..”

“Whoa, really? That’s cool!”

“Hmm, I went there once. For about 20 minutes.”

It was Shooter that chuckled this time, “Just 20 minutes?”

“More like I didn’t stay for more than, a hour maybe? 20 minutes of being wow’d by an universe where no one has any physical forms, and 40 minutes getting into an argument with someone there.”

Shooter let out a laugh, “What did you argued about?”

“Apparently I was somehow trespassing. Well forgive me for not knowing when everything is made up of freaking words.” The Colonel rolled his eyes and scoffed as Shooter laughed at the story, “There was also the universe where instead of a black night, it was a pink night. That was a field trip from back in my Academy days.”

“Depend on how pink it is, I can either deal just fine or I’ll end up with a headache with 30 minutes. But it still sounds rad nonetheless.”

“The most unsettling universe I went too was one 105 trillion universes to the right of our universe.” The Colonel leaned in a bit closer, “No organic life existed in that universe. I was the only organic one there.”

“Damn.” Just the idea freaked Shooter out in some level.

“I would’ve not even fucking gone there, but I was 105 and stupid, so I went on a dare.”

“I see haha. How long were you there?”

“Overnight.”

“Was it worth it?”

“I got bragging rights, and some money, so it felt worth it at the time.”

Shooter nodded, 105 probably the equivalent of the college age years to a Time Lord so to speak he reckoned with inward amusement, “You think there’s any aliens on the planet up there? Like, I dunno, gas aliens?” 

The Colonel looked at the planet, “I don’t know to be honest. Could be, there are gas based life forms in our universe.”

“Cool. Would be real interesting if it turned out there is no aliens in this one.” Shooter commented.

“That’ll be boring if you ask me, where would be the variety? The universe is made all the more interesting when there is more than just humans.” 

“Figure you’ll say that.” Shooter teased with a smile, and they shared a good natured laugh between them.

“I like y’all the best though, humanity so…normal and yet so innovative and brilliant at the same time,” The Colonel rambled on a bit, “And the time it took from not having much advanced tech to where you gone to the moon, develop better medicine and computers….” The Colonel stopped to reevaluate what just came out, he always took care to make sure he didn’t insulted humanity in some way, “Maybe normal not the best choice of words.”

Shooter shook his head and assured him, “No, it was fine, I get what you’re trying to say. Compared to Time Lords at face value we’re, uhh, pretty boring.” Shooter casually laughed that faded into a friendly smile..

The Colonel repaid the favor and dismissed his claims, “Y’all are not boring, if anything we are.” He pointed to himself for emphasis as he laughed, “Lazy too, at least the government. I met one of the Doctor’s companions who told me Gallifrey tend to leave the Master as the Doctor’s problem, not theirs unless he is on the planet itself.”

“That ain’t good. Wait, I take it the Master not a good guy?” Shooter felt a tad confused.

“Not really from what I was told, and from what I’ve found on the internet.”

Shooter nodded a bit, “Who’d you meet?” He was curious. He knew sometimes the Colonel would take little mini trips around the world here and there past, present or future.

“Martha Jones, very nice-” The Colonel started to tell him when they both suddenly heard the unmistakable sound of wood breaking followed by raised voices that came from the inside. They turned to the door and saw what looked like a fight might’ve just begun. The voices seemed to encourage the fight between whomever decided to duke it out, “What the hell?”

They both looked in the direction of the door and through the window. Just from the fact that the Colonel noticed Shelton walked towards to the door, he got the feeling that he was the one that threw whoever over a table. Yes, perhaps maybe he wanted to get out of there before it escalated, but it just felt too much of a coincidence given how soon it was. Plus Shelton walked with a heavy step outside and to their table with a pissed off vibe.

“Probably a good thing Kris ain’t here, otherwise he’ll tan your ass 10 ways to Sunday!” The Colonel started calmly as he sent a look his way. Shooter, meanwhile, laughed under his breath because that comment was sure as hell true, Kris would and also make a rug out of said hide, probably make one for Jessi too, “Do I guess right that you threw someone onto a table?”

Shelton has his arms crossed and he leaned back as he replied in a matter of fact tone, “Yes. Yes I did, he insinuated my dad wasn’t fit to live in society and should be locked up in a mental facility so. Don’t worry I didn’t say anything.” 

The Colonel sighed while he still looked at Shelton. Shooter just looked between the two, they have gone into little mini arguments, the kind that usually blows over quickly, as opposed to long and dragged out fights, “I’m glad of that, but we’re in another world Shelton, you have to be extra careful!”

“That’s why I came out here before the fucker had a chance to come at me. I didn’t want to get into a fight and have the cops called on me.”

“Dude, you should’ve done that before! And you have to remember people here don’t know that your dad is from another universe. What happened exactly?” The Colonel paused then carefully asked the next part. He knew Shelton does not intentionally fuck things up when they are out in space and about. It was just Shelton had a tendency to lose control a little easier after he had a few. Just add in someone else being a dick and well, you get the idea. And it wasn’t Shelton that had to watch himself on that, he has to do the same as well. And even more at that because, unlike Shelton, he is a a Time Lord. And Time Lords have abilities humans do not have. Like mind wiping abilities for one.

“Admittedly I already had a few, but as I minded myself up at the bar, just enjoying the music and stuff, this drunk idiot came up and started to rag on me for my opinion on dad getting arrested while he badmouthed him at the same time. I kindly warned him to back on. Twice as I was in no mood for that shit, and I was trying to keep myself in check.”

“But you knocked him out?” Shooter guessed as he faced Shelton.

‘Yep. When he kept it up and said its a good thing my dad was arrested.” Shelton confirmed. He felt already that the Colonel wouldn’t like hearing that. Shooter on the other hand felt like he got a ticket to the premiere of a new argument.

“What?! Shelton, look I get where you’re coming from but-” The Colonel took a deep sigh while he realized maybe stuff of this nature should be in a more private area, as there was some other people out here still. And it was more the fact they were in another world. Thus the Colonel didn’t want any of them to get unwanted attention, especially with the situation. That said, however, Shelton should have just walked out of the building in the first place, “How about we talk about this elsewhere.” The Colonel stated as he stood up.

Shelton stood up after him, “Lead the way.” The two walked off down to a secluded area in the parking lot. Shooter stay back at the table as he watched his two friends go off. He would’ve followed, but he would’ve just felt awkward more than anything, like a third wheel. Hell it was already getting awkward with how the Colonel was obviously more than a little unhappy with what happened. 

He can get why the Colonel started to tell Shelton off, but at the same time he can get why Shelton knocked the guy’s light out in the first place. If someone started sprouting bullshit about his dad right in his face, then he would also feel pissed off at the dude. Shooter looked at his phone, he knew if this was anything like before, they’ll eventually come back soon like in 10 minutes or less. 

However 15 minutes passed before he looked up from googling his counterpart in this universe. He felt some dread come up when he didn’t see either of them coming back, they must be really going at each other. He can see Shelton in the parking lot and no sign of the Colonel or the Tardis. Shit, this ain’t good. He became more aware then he wanted to be of the fact he was in a world that ain’t his own. And fucking hell, why is he having an unexpected flashback to the Gallifrey Incident? He knew he wasn’t alone, Shelton and the Colonel were there, so his brain should register that he was ok right? Damn it, screw his brain, screw the unexpected minor panic attack that threatened to burst through. But thankfully, thank god, he had better control over it now and knew what to do. First thing first, take a deep breath and get away from the nearby people, they, indirectly, didn’t serve to help much.

Next, tell himself he wasn’t on Gallifrey. That usually helped along with the deep breaths. A part of him wished the Colonel didn’t leave, usually he felt more safe from unexpected alien attacks with him there. What the hell happened between them that made him leave in the Tardis and drive off? 

Shooter took a couple or so deep breaths before he got up, he muttered the reminder to himself as he focused his eyes on Shelton. Anywhere else and the memories may or may not come back a little more stronger,. That was also one of his tricks to getting through an unexpected attack, focus on Shelton (or something else that worked just the same), that served as a confirmation that he was very much alright.

“Shelton? Shelton, where’s Jon? I don’t see him.,” Shooter called out as he walked over to where his other friend was at near the sidewalk, “And we’re in a completely different universe.” Shooter said with such realization and acute awareness in his tone that Shelton got the feeling he might’ve gotten a light flashback of memories. “Shit.” Shelton thought as he lightly sprinted a bit to get to Shooter.

Shelton placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, “Shooter are you alright? Just take a deep breath dude. We’re not on Gallifrey, we’re on Earth.”

“Not our Earth though.” Shooter pointed out.

That was a fair point, he was right with that, “True, but we’re on an Earth. I don’t think golden trash cans are gonna attack us anytime soon.” Shelton assured him. The Colonel had shown him a pic of what the Daleks looked once time.

Shooter managed to chuckle, that description is still funny and it did always helped to quell the anxiety attack completely in the early stage, “Why is the Colonel gone? What happened?” Shooter paused as he can hear faint sounds from the background, “An can we go somewhere where there’s no people?” He added as he put his hands in his pockets. 

Shelton nodded and pointed down the road that lead outside of the city, “Sure let’s go that way.” The two started to walk as Shelton continued, “To answer the other question, I called him a hypocrite,”

“You did?”

“Yeah, remember that time we took a trip to that high technological, but still primitive planet called Nanea, I think?”

It took a few seconds, but Shooter remembered and nodded yes, Shelton went further, “Yeah, people there had tribes and everything like North America in ancient times.”

“Yeah, well our Time Lord buddy punched a guy and got into a bit of a fight.’

“Oh yeah! I remember that, he said the guy insulted us pretty much.”

Shelton nodded, “He seemed to had forgotten that part, so I “kindly” reminded him. He tried to excuse it as being a different situation than what I just did. That, to which, I said was utter complete bullshit. We went on, we managed to insult each other, and here we are.” 

“Is that when he left?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

“Good god, Kris would tanned both your asses.” Shooter chuckled and Shelton smiled amused, “But in seriousness, that don’t sound good.”

“It doesn’t. I just don’t remember our arguments getting this bad before.” Shelton admitted. 

“We weren’t in another universe those other times either.”

The two kept the pace in comfortable silence until they noticed an abandoned wooden barn not to far off. They decided to head over there to sit down and rest. They didn’t really have anywhere to go since the Colonel went off to blow off steam. The two took in the peaceful surroundings and the “moon” in the sky, it half that and half looking on their phones. 

“Are you feeling better?” Shelton wanted to be sure he will wasn’t on the verge of an attack. 

Shooter looked at Shelton and shook his head, “Yeah, I think so. Being away from people helps.”

“I getcha. Plus we can pretend we’re not in an alternative universe.”

“The gas planet in the sky makes it kinda hard.” Shooter casually laughed before it faded out not to long after.

There was a paused silence that filled the air for a few seconds, “Jon is real good with that seeing different timelines thing he has.” Shooter shared, “He used that at one point to figure out the best route back to the Tardis when he rescued me and the Gallifreyan kid. We were in a shed with Daleks that seemed to come down from all sides outside, I was freaked out as hell. He kept telling me to trust him, and we’ll make it out ok.”

“Obviously you did.”

“Yeah. The point in that, is knowing I can trust him to make everything right also helped me to get better if I’m about to feel real freaked out.”

“Hmm, always nice to count on someone like him to get us out of real huge shit the rare time it happens.” 

They ended up taking turns resting with one asleep while the other kept watch just in case. They didn’t see the Colonel again until a few hours later when the sun started to come up. By then, the argument was put aside as they still had a much higher thing to worry about on the priority list. The Colonel appeared in the Tardis as he drove down in the field and parked it near them. 

“Guys! I have good news!” The Colonel announced as he quickly got out of the car and ran over as Shooter and Shelton stood up, “I found Hank Jr. He’s in an abandoned one room schoolhouse with another person, whom he seemed to befriended. But-” The Colonel’s voice hitched up for a few seconds.

“But what? Is he ok?” Shooter asked, he and Shelton looked at the Colonel to continue. The hesitation caused them to be cautiously optimistic.

The Colonel sighed somenly as he felt bad for Hank Jr, “He is, he just, sounded lost and, sounded like he relegated himself to living out his life here. Which also bring up another point, we have to be careful in how we tell him about me. We don’t want to overwhelm him more then he might be already.”

“That sounds good.” Shelton replied.


	15. Chapter 15

When the Colonel stormed off and teleported off to blow off steam, he drove a hour and a half. Turned out where he stopped, there was an abandoned building just up the road, a small.one. His Time Lord sight made him swore he saw a figure that looked like Hank Jr. It appeared to be an old run down schoolhouse hidden in the trees when he crept up to get a closer look, and currently, the Colonel had just led them up to the door. 

On the way over, there were two things that happened. The Colonel called Terri to let her know that they found Hank Jr, and they were on their way to rescue him, and he and Shelton apologized for how last night ended. Unlike how one may see in the movies, or in other forms of media, the apologies all around between the two were short and sweet. 

The Colonel knocked on the door and they can hear noises from inside. A couple of seconds later, the door opened and Denver popped his head out, then turned back inside and exclaimed, “They ain’t cops Randall.” He sounded relieved as he turned back around and stepped out, “Hey?” He greeted confused, he hoped they weren’t undercover cops. That’ll be bad.

“Hey, I’m the Colonel, this is Shooter and Shelton.” He greeted as he pointed to the other two.

“Oh, I’m Denver. Out names might’ve be listed on the news as fugitives.” Denver joked with a smile.

“We heard about the prison breakout.”

“Yeah, Randall helped out with some of the logistics. I started the whole idea though, me and Randall shared a cell.” He clarified and the Colonel nodded.

“I’m assuming Bocephus is still back there?” Shooter asked as he pointed to the door.

Denver nodded, “Yeah, he’s been laying on his makeshift bed in the back there most of the morning. Dude doesn’t really have anyone here at all. I mean neither do I, but I was born in this world.” He explained, “You and Shelton don’t happen to be the ones Randall told me about from his world? The names sounded familiar. He didn’t say about anyone called the Colonel though..” Denver looked at the Colonel.

“He didn’t happen to refer to me as Jon Hensley did he?”

Denver felt a mental light bulb go on as his eyes widen with recognition, “Oh he did! He did mentioned that name too. You must be the guys that he saw in the police car.”

“We are.” The Colonel confirmed as he took out the world hopping device from his pocket, “See this? This was the device that accidentally sent Shelton’s dad here.”

“Oh, I’m confused now, I thought he said his Earth was about the same tech wise to here.”

“It is. Hank Jr just doesn’t know what I am. I’m not from Earth.”

Denver nodded, his geek boy side grew excitedly at the same time his rational side kicked in. What if these three were some elaborate scammers or something? Somehow? He didn’t want to put his new friend through any more emotional trauma, “Could, um-” Denver awkwardly started, “How do I know you’re not imposters?”

“That’s a reasonable question.” The Colonel replied as Shooter took out his phone to show him some pics. They didn’t really want to take too much time with this rescue mission, so he thought pics of his mom, Kris and others would suffice for now.

“Here, you can look at my photos,” Shooter offered as he handed it to him, “That’s my mom Jessi, and Kris Kristofferson.” 

He didn’t end up looking at the other pictures, as the one Shooter showed him was apparently sufficient enough, the Kris Kristofferson Denver knew was a high ranking military officer in Sweden that everyone read about in history class. Denver faced the Colonel with excitement in this voice, “Holy shit! This means you are an alien! I have to tell Randall he’s getting rescued after all!” Denver just felt excited for his friend and who can blame him. Denver felt really bad for him and a small part of him hoped somehow his friend will get rescued, “Hey Randall-

However, the Colonel grabbed him before he can make it back inside, “Denver hold on, we don’t want to bombard him,. We don’t want him to feel really overwhelmed.” He pointed out calmly.

“How do we do that then?”

“Good question. Well, we have to tell him we ain’t imposters first.”

Denver thought for a second as he looked at the grass aimlessly, then his face turned bright with an idea. He didn’t get a chance to air it since they all heard another voice that came from the doorway, “What’s going on out here?”

Denver felt himself froze a bit in awkwardness, mostly from the fact he wasn’t sure what to say. He got the impression they had to be careful in how they do this, “Uhh, well-” He ended up being cut off.

“You look like the ones I saw on the sidewalk.” Hank Jr said in a monotonous voice, directed at the other three, he leaned up against the doorframe on his side.

“That’s cause we are, we saw you too.” Shooter supplied. 

Hank Jr had his arms crossed against his chest as he took in the information, he looked liked he didn’t know what exactly to believe, “We ain’t imposters, we came over here to rescue you.” Shelton added.

To Hank Jr, seeing all three up close he knew they looked so much like the ones he knew from back home. He knew he can’t ignore it, at least part of him knew that, but the rest, the logical part didn’t know what to think. Were they somehow imposters? After he had thought about it here and there overtime, he realized it might be impossible for them to be imposters, as they would have to know things about him that he hadn’t told outside of Denver.

“You came here to rescue me?”  
“Yeah, it understandably sounds real crazy to you and we’ll explain everything, but we came over to get you dad.” 

Hank Jr didn’t speak for a good minute, his mind felt like it had a computer error and was in need of a reboot. He felt like he was on the verge of a mild headache. The Colonel took this time to get out the world hopping device he took from the Tardis earlier, he held it out in front of Hank Jr, “Remember this? This is what got you here in the first place.” 

Hank Jr finally pushed himself off and made his way over to get a closer look. Yeah that headache started to blossom more to the point it was dull, but noticeable, “I’ve got a headache…” He muttered out loud and the Colonel sympathized..

“I understand sir, it’s a lot to take in-”

“Then start explaining son. That damn thing looks like the same thing that caused this whole damn mess! Y’all look the same people I’ve met before back home and he,” Hank Jr gestured to Shelton, “looks exactly like my eldest, so unless there is another of one of them bracelets, there ain’t no way y’all could’ve gotten over here. I might as well be having some elaborate dream!” Hank Jr vented, understandably a little frustrated. 

“Dad you ain’t dreaming, we are really here, I’ll prove it even. ” Shelton said as he walked up and put his arms around Hank Jr in a hug. That was a last minute thing, but he figured that would work just as well other than the cliched pinching oneself. 

Hank Jr stood there for a few seconds speechless, he can’t deny this, the reality of being hugged that feels so real. It was this moment that a great emotion of elated joy came over him. He was really gonna go home! He was being rescued. Happy and relieved he repaid the hug to his son and smiled.

“Stuff like this warms both of my hearts.” The Colonel admitted casually as he watched the heartwarming scene.

“If I had two hearts, I would say the same.” Denver replied. Shooter chuckled at Denver’s comment.

A minute later Shelton and Hank Jr pulled apart, the latter faced the former still confused, “How’d did y’all even get over here?!”

The Colonel took this moment to slowly ease him into the whole alien thing. He didn’t want to make him feel overwhelmed, much like how Shooter was when they first met. He remember how confused he was when he was thrusted suddenly into the reality of things way to fast. He didn’t want something similar to happen to Hank Jr. 

Or that was his plan, if Shelton hadn’t just cut to the chase as he was about to speak.

“He’s an alien.” Shelton casually pointed in the Colonel’s direction. The Colonel responded by giving him a momentarily midly annoyed look his way.

“A what?” Hank Jr felt skeptical, but he’ll be stupid to deny they did exist if he was shown they did.

“An alien. Dad do you know all those movies that have aliens in them like, um, Aliens or, Independence Day?”

Hank Jr thought for a second before he nodded, “Yeah, I’ve seen those movies.”

“Great, while those movie aliens are completely fictional, the idea of space aliens from other planets do exist, and Jon is from one called Gallifrey.”

“He’s called the Colonel, but everyone calls him Jon.” Shooter supplemented, “He’s what you call a Time Lord.”

Hank Jr paused for a second so he can parsed what he’d been told, “But don’t….ain’t aliens just a Hollywood thing?” 

“Nope, not just a Hollywood thing dad, They do exist.”

“You mean like them little bug eyed green aliens?”

“No, I mean, well I don’t know if there is something like them exactly, but we humans ain’t alone.”

“There are many different kinds of aliens out there, some good, some bad. Depends on the person you meet, just like humans.” The Colonel added.

“You look human though, I take it some can pass for us?” Hank Jr surmised, it felt surreal to think that there is life on other planets. Still, he wanted to get home, he can wrap his head around the fact afterwards.

“Yeah. Time Lords can pass for a human. There are several species that can pass for one.’ The Colonel answered. 

Hank Jr asked more about it and the Colonel explained in basic terms how exactly they’d gotten over here. About the Tardis and everything (Shooter cut in excitedly about how it was bigger on the inside). He felt immense gratitude for this moment than he did in recent memories, more than he care to show. 

But he also didn’t want to be an asshole to his new friend, leave Denver in the dust and all that. The kid hadn’t gotten anyone else here and he didn’t want to leave him in the dust. Not after the way he helped him out of the prison, and Denver listened to him without dismissing him as someone crazy as he feared, “I don’t know how all this works and I think I need time to wrap my head around all this,” He admitted truthfully as he faced the Colonel. Thank god he spoke to an understanding alien he thought if his calm vibe was anything to go by. He did felt awkward telling him about his idea to ask Denver if he wanted to start life over in his home universe, “but, I don’t want to be an asshole to my friend over there and he has nothing tied to this world-”

“I get ya, but it’s up to him.” The Colonel assured him with a friendly smile.


	16. Chapter 16

They all ended up made one more tip back to Terri’s place, Denver had elected to stay (he didn’t want to screw up anything, and, understandable, he wanted enough familiarity world wise) However, he had asked the Colonel to help him get out of the fugitive and rut he was in, hence the trip. The Colonel had told her how Denver regretted his life of petty crime and wanted to get his life back to a decent one. He had gave him a little perception filter device as well that he can wear so no one would recognize him as the fugitive. Only they and Terri knew of his real name and look now. 

A reasonable compromise was met, Denver was put on probation of sorts due to his criminal background (hIs offer even), and he would work as her new assistant due to a problem when the one she initially had.

And speaking of Terri and Denver, they wanted to stay in contact with the others. They both didn’t want to lose touch so both of their phone were upgraded. To Denver, Hank Jr felt like the only older guy he talked to in recent years that actually was friendly, and didn’t treated him like he was a lifelong petty thief. 

“I feel terribly sorry you had to go through all this.” Terri apologized as she faced Hank Jr. 

He just shook his head lightly and smiled, “Don’t worry about it ma’am, it’s alright, I’m just real happy to be able to go home. Thank you for helping the boys out and everything.” Hank Jr felt appreciative of everything she did.

Terri gave a grateful smile, “Anytime. I tried my best to help get you out as quick as possible despite everything.” Terri signed in relief on his behalf, and a silence filled the air for a quick second, “I suspect politics and the media are just as crazy in any other dimensions.”

“It just as nuts in my world.” Hank Jr laughed softly. If there was anything that wasn’t jarringly different for him, it was the general craziness of politics and politicians, “I just have one thing I want to know before we go.” He admittedly was curious about the outcome of the election due to wanting to see this politician version of his friend get knocked off his pedestal so to speak. He wanted to have some sorta justice done for false imprisonment, and made up claims in the media.

“Oh sure.”

“Did you won? I didn’t pay too much attention to the news in prison but...just so I sleep a little better.” He teased a bit with a friendly smile.

Terri nodded, “I did.” And that the moment they all heard Shelton make a sudden noise of celebrations.

“Yes!” Shelton uttered under his breath. 

It may have been a tad louder than he wanted as Shooter and Denver laughed. Meanwhile, Hank Jr looked at him for a second then rolled his eyes lightly as he faced Terri to explain, “Shelton got some problems with our, um, version of Ritchie.”

“Is he a politician too.”

“Nope. He is a musician.”  
Terri sighed another breath of relief then chuckled, “Oh thank god.”

“Yeah, haha. Trust me, he is much nicer guy than the politician version y’all have. Looks different enough too.”

“That’s good to hear.” Terri genuinely replied with a smile.

The boys said their goodbyes to her and Denver as they walked back to the Tardis. Currently, Hank Jr sat on the small couch in the main console room as he took in the sight of the inside, it was definitely quite a bit to take in, “How can all of this fit inside a car?”

“Time Lord tech. Don’t ask Jon about the details though, otherwise we’ll be here for a hour.” Shelton teased with a smile.

“I go off on a tangent one time..” The Colonel playfully rolled his eyes as he laughed while he went around to set up for the return trip.

Hank Jr chuckled, “How big is this ship then?”

“Big. So big an universe can fit in here.” Shooter smiled excitedly. He and Shelton sat down on the couch on next to Hank Jr, “It’s mind blowingly awesome!”

“It’s infinite space in here, so I don’t recommend going off on your own in here. You can really get lost in here.” The Colonel added and Hank Jr nodded.

“I understand the last part clearly.” Hank Jr admitted.

“It can be hard to wrap your head around. Just think of it as there’s no boundaries set in place here. Nothing to limit the space.” The Colonel activated the Tardis and didn’t say anything until after the rumbling stopped, “We’re back.”

“Oh thank god, I missed my own world.” Hank Jr happily sighed.

“We have to do one thing first, a retcon.” The Colonel informed him.

Hank Jr gave him a confused look before it dawned on him, “A retcon? Why?....Oh because of my absence?”

The Colonel nodded, “It’s been a media nightmare to be honest sir. A retcon will fix everything, I’m gonna go get Kris and Jessi, so y’all stay here and I’ll be back in a moment.” He immediately went up the stairs as Hank Jr was left still confused a little over things. He was practically left to wonder how bad exactly,did it get. Did he even wanted to know?

“How...wait they know about this too?” Hank Jr turned around and directed the question at the other two as the sound of the door opened and closed. Were there more of his friends that knew aliens existed? He wouldn’t be surprised if Merle was in on it as well, that guy likes the aliens exists idea.

“Yeah. It’s just them and us that know about this.” Shelton stated, “Jon feels the world ain’t ready yet to just casually reveal he ain’t human.”

“Right that, that makes sense.” Hank Jr calmly said. If he can feel like he can keep the whole trapped in another universe temporarily, then he can sure as hell keep the alien part a secret as well, “How’d they found out?”

“Um, that’s a long story. We’ll tell you another time.” Shooter simply stated a little awkwardly. Shelton looked at him for a second than back at his dad and added some clarity he knew he would understand.

“Let’s just say you had a uhh….more ideal way of learning aliens exist dad.” Shetlon added and there was a pause before Hank Jr nodded with enough understanding.

“Ok gotcha, I think.”

“I will say though, Jon rescued me. Can’t thank him enough for that.” Shooter supplied with a friendly grin. 

“Oh really? I always knew he was a great guy the last times we’ve met.”

“Yeah, I was lucky.” Shooter finished before he changed the subject a little bit, “You want to know how long since he lived here on Earth?!” 

“Sure.”

“He’s been here since the early 1800s! Specifically since 1803.”

 

Hank Jr’s curiosity piqued up, he was a huge Civil War buff. This meant he can actually ask someone who lived through it about his experience first hand! Of course he was alien too, so there is a chance it could just be summed up as ‘Silly humans and their petty wars.’ The fact that Jon didn’t seem the type to do the latter if his past encounters (back when he thought he was a human) kept his worryness about that at bay. The implication that the Colonel’s lifespan was longer wasn’t lost on him either, “So his kind is immortal or something?”

“No. They more like age a hell of a lot slower than us, and they have something called incarnations where after a certain point they’ll regenerate into a new body. They have 13 of those.”

“You’ve had more than one incarnations due to the 70s/80s if you were a Time Lord Hank.” Shooter joked and Hank Jr casually laughed.

“Somehow I have a damn good feeling I would.” He chuckled in response just has he heard a familiar friendly voice that came from the stairs.

“Bocephus! It’s great to see you again buddy!” Kris exclaimed with a smile, he and Jessi had held onto hope that they’ll see their longtime friend again. Hank Jr’s face lit up as he and Kris ran over to give each other a hug. Jessi, meanwhile, went over to hug her son before she got a chance to give Hank Jr a welcome hug home.

“I knew you’ll be safe, but it’s still great to see y’all back!” Jessi exclaimed, just relieved about everything surrounding this pretty much, “Somehow we got everyone thinking Hank Jr mysteriously left his old life.”

“We didn’t really go into detail, but we didn’t want anyone thinking something tragic happened.” Kris supplemented.

Hank Jr felt bad that his family probably thought he was some kinda asshole for seemingly left abruptly for a new life, “I would ask more, but, uhh, Jon said there was gonna be a retcon.”

“Yep. As I understand it, everything will be fixed up to a certain before this all happened and, basically all of us here will remember this different timeline.” Kris answered in his own way.  
___________________________

A few minutes later it was as if Hank Jr never disappeared all of a sudden, along with the boys to rescue him. The Colonel had a device that helped to reset time of a worldly magnitude. Now they were back at the party, just outside the driveway, the Colonel had time be frozen for the time being until they got inside and in place. From then on everything would proceed as if nothing ever happened. 

They walked around to the back, Hank Jr got a pack of beer from the kitchen first just to make it look like he went to refill the cooler with refreshments. Time became unfrozen and the party went on with the usual happy vibe in the air. Hank Jr’s wife talked to his two daughters while the other guests mingled around. Shelton and Jessi had already went back into the group of people, “I feel like I have one more thing to do,” The Colonel started as he looked around, “and that is to punch whoever buried that world hopping device here.”

“Pick your battles son.” Kris wisely advised him before he went back into the swing of things.

Hank Jr, however, paused for a brief second before he admitted once Kris was out of earshot, “I want to punch whoever that SOB is too.” He looked at his friend Kid Rock who got out some of the finished burgers out on a plate, ready to eat. He knew this Kid Rock was way different then the one from the other world, and thank god for that. He didn’t want to be reminded of the other, more politicized version.

“Oh, hey um, you can trust me to keep this whole space alien thing a secret.” He kept his voice low enough as he wanted the Colonel to know he was trustworthy enough, “I ain’t about to reveal that I gone to another universe where the two countries here are flipped and that Earth revolves around a giant gas planet.”

“Don’t worry, I trust you sir.” The Colonel assured him with a smile.

“Despite everything, it was pretty interesting to see how different an Earth can be from ours.” Hank Jr stated. 

“There are way more different alternative versions of Earth out there, the one we went to is more on the tame side.”

There was a weird feeling to be had that brewed all of a sudden in Shelton’s stomach, a feeling of gratitude and appreciation that Kid Rock wasn’t as obnoxious and mean as the alternative counterpart of his is. He can definitely handle this version better in hindsight when you get down to it. And given whom the target of this emotion is, Shelton also felt a little awkward. He wanted to do something for him, in some way as thanks for not being a total a-hole to his dad, without compromising anything. Or come off as weird in someway, though he ain’t too worried about that.

Shelton grabbed a bottle of beer on the way, “Hey, um, this is gonna sound pretty weird coming from me so just um....shut up and roll with me here.” He started out as he looked down at the bottle for a second then back at Kid Rock as he lightly chuckled, “Here, I got you a beer if you wanted another one.”

“Haha, well thanks.” Kid Rock sounded sincere so that was good, he wasn’t taken aback by the admittedly out of the blue gesture given Shelton’s issues with him.

“I’m glad my dad has a friend like you, you know.” Shelton honestly said. 

“Thanks, yeah. Same vice versa, your dad a great guy. If hypothetically he went to jail, I totally bail him.”

“I trust you on that.” Shelton sincerely replied before he walked off. He walked aimlessly around until he ran into the Colonel and Shooter. That was an odd but good enough feeling to be had where he didn’t felt like punching Kid Rock, or whatever, the entire time he talked to him.


End file.
